RAF re-open radar base on Britain's most northerly island

A remote Cold War radio base on a Scottish island is being re-opened for the first time in over a decade.

By The Newsroom

Published 17th Sep 2017, 15:45 BST

Updated 17th Sep 2017, 15:55 BST

Saxa Vord on Unst in the Shetlands shut in 2006 as relations with Russia improved, and operators the RAF left the communications station.

The radar scans the Atlantic waters around Iceland and Norway, and the site will open again in October with around 30 personnel manning it.

Defence minister Harriet Baldwin wrote to the area's MP, Alistair Carmichael, to tell him of the plans.

The UK's most northerly island suffered a significant population drop when the RAF left, and has since become a tourist destination home to just 600 permanent residents.

Unst is closer to Norwegian railway stations than any in mainland Scotland. The radar base was discovered to have been on a list of Soviet targets following the end of the Cold War.

During several decades of RAF occupation, around 250 staff were based on Saxa Vord, and there were facilities including a fire station and a medical centre.