In search of unreported epicenes, @albino-jay, @Eastyham and I found ourselves in an area with not much about, except people with six fingers and toes, sheep, fields and an epic mill we’d missed by just a few weeks. So, to get something done, we did a bit of research over a Maccies and took the radical decision to drive right across the country to nail something interesting, if not unreported. So off we went to Grimsby…
History
Fish fucking stink if you don’t keep them cold and then when you eat them you get food poisoning and that’s grim. So, fish get packaged with ice to stop that happening and because, as legend would have it, Grimsby was once the busiest fishing port in the world, unsurprisingly it had an ice factory. The ice factory opened in 1901 and it’s 4350 square meters took two years to build. When it was firing on all five ammonia compressors it produced a whopping 1,200 tonnes of ice a day.
Grimsby Ice Factory is now a Grade II listed building and it’s on the Heritage at Risk Register. And we should have been too, walking around on it’s soggy floors of plummeting death. But, it’s more that a mere building. It’s also on the World Monuments Watch list as a building of historical importance that’s at risk of being lost to the elements, which I guess makes a change from being lost to Pikies. Part of its international allure are the four-cylinder vertical valve ammonia compressors that are still on site, partially hidden from Pikies by conservationist pigeons under a metric fuck tonne of their shit. These are apparently the only surviving example of this machinery on the planet. It's an unusual, but effective deterrent, because other than the odd tag, the site seems largely untouched by vandals.
Despite its historical significance and a plan to restore and renovate the site into a leisure complex that would include a cinema, pub and a climbing wall (three things everyone immediately associates with each other and ammonia compressors) the Heritage Lottery Fund declined to stump up the £11 million needed. That is, even though, the plans were drafted to keep the ammonia compressors on site for historical purposes.
The Shenanigans
We quickly surmounted the things that were meant to keep people out and found ourselves standing on a thick carpet of pigeon shit, with the low winter sun casting beams of light into the darkness through holes in the ceiling and the few windows that were high enough not to bother with boarding. They're often invisible on camera, so Eastyham fired off a couple of lung fulls of vape to bring them out.
This is near the end of the production line where massive slabs of ice were bathed in calcium chloride brine solution to help remove them from their cans. From here they'd be crushed and taken to the fish market.
Each one of these massive cans produced 3.5 tonnes of ice a pop.
Live wires photo, because urbex.
More shards of light, lung fulls of vape, and decaying industry prettiness.
I think this is possibly part of the Orgasmatron that Barbarella experience or maybe just something to do with making ice for the fishing industry.
Before we move onto the compressors. Switches, but with a cheeky glimpse of compressor in the background.
What the switches belong to...
Compressor number four...
Close up...
I don't know what was through here. I did not have authority so didn't look...
Compressor number five. For some reason this compressors doesn't get a mention in the historical resources online. Not sure if it is a later compressor that isn't as important. The pigeons haven't spent much time hiding it either. I liked the reflections on the tiles through the grime through.
In this room, [EASTYHAM WAS ATTACKED WHILE URB3XING BY A RABID FOX AND NEARLY DIED], so we had a refrigerator compressor room beer to recuperate before checking out the remainder of the derp for other clickbait titles.
Finally, a snap over looking the compressor room taking in compressors 2, 3 and 4.
And that was more or less that. We did check out some other things in the vicinity and on the way home, but nothing really to write home about.
Cheers for reading. Hope you enjoyed the report.
EOA
History
Fish fucking stink if you don’t keep them cold and then when you eat them you get food poisoning and that’s grim. So, fish get packaged with ice to stop that happening and because, as legend would have it, Grimsby was once the busiest fishing port in the world, unsurprisingly it had an ice factory. The ice factory opened in 1901 and it’s 4350 square meters took two years to build. When it was firing on all five ammonia compressors it produced a whopping 1,200 tonnes of ice a day.
Grimsby Ice Factory is now a Grade II listed building and it’s on the Heritage at Risk Register. And we should have been too, walking around on it’s soggy floors of plummeting death. But, it’s more that a mere building. It’s also on the World Monuments Watch list as a building of historical importance that’s at risk of being lost to the elements, which I guess makes a change from being lost to Pikies. Part of its international allure are the four-cylinder vertical valve ammonia compressors that are still on site, partially hidden from Pikies by conservationist pigeons under a metric fuck tonne of their shit. These are apparently the only surviving example of this machinery on the planet. It's an unusual, but effective deterrent, because other than the odd tag, the site seems largely untouched by vandals.
Despite its historical significance and a plan to restore and renovate the site into a leisure complex that would include a cinema, pub and a climbing wall (three things everyone immediately associates with each other and ammonia compressors) the Heritage Lottery Fund declined to stump up the £11 million needed. That is, even though, the plans were drafted to keep the ammonia compressors on site for historical purposes.
The Shenanigans
We quickly surmounted the things that were meant to keep people out and found ourselves standing on a thick carpet of pigeon shit, with the low winter sun casting beams of light into the darkness through holes in the ceiling and the few windows that were high enough not to bother with boarding. They're often invisible on camera, so Eastyham fired off a couple of lung fulls of vape to bring them out.
This is near the end of the production line where massive slabs of ice were bathed in calcium chloride brine solution to help remove them from their cans. From here they'd be crushed and taken to the fish market.
Each one of these massive cans produced 3.5 tonnes of ice a pop.
Live wires photo, because urbex.
More shards of light, lung fulls of vape, and decaying industry prettiness.
I think this is possibly part of the Orgasmatron that Barbarella experience or maybe just something to do with making ice for the fishing industry.
Before we move onto the compressors. Switches, but with a cheeky glimpse of compressor in the background.
What the switches belong to...
Compressor number four...
Close up...
I don't know what was through here. I did not have authority so didn't look...
Compressor number five. For some reason this compressors doesn't get a mention in the historical resources online. Not sure if it is a later compressor that isn't as important. The pigeons haven't spent much time hiding it either. I liked the reflections on the tiles through the grime through.
In this room, [EASTYHAM WAS ATTACKED WHILE URB3XING BY A RABID FOX AND NEARLY DIED], so we had a refrigerator compressor room beer to recuperate before checking out the remainder of the derp for other clickbait titles.
Finally, a snap over looking the compressor room taking in compressors 2, 3 and 4.
And that was more or less that. We did check out some other things in the vicinity and on the way home, but nothing really to write home about.
Cheers for reading. Hope you enjoyed the report.
EOA
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yep there is definitely that. Love the daylight streaming in, great photos. love old machines, im like a magnet too them lol.
