‘Abandoned’ Kilchoan villagers told to travel 20 miles for hot meal

Villagers who have been without power for days say they feel “abandoned” after their electricity distributor advised they travel more than 20 miles for a hot meal.

Food and fuel supplies have been dwindling in the village of Kilchoan, which is near the end of the Ardnamurchan peninsula in the Highlands, since Storm Amy struck on Friday evening.

Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) told customers it had provided welfare vans, but the nearest to Kilchoan was in Acharacle – a 50-minute drive away along a single-track road.

The BBC understands the road was too narrow for the vehicles organised by SSEN and it has now arranged for a local food van to supply meals.

Rosie Curtis, a crofter and chair of the West Ardnamurchan Community Council, criticised the communication from SSEN which she described as “ridiculous”.

“You just feel abandoned,” she told BBC Scotland News. “Just because we’re at the bottom of the road doesn’t mean we don’t matter.”

Storm Amy, the first named storm of the season, left a trail of destruction and tens of thousands of homes without power across Scotland.

SSEN has reconnected 86,000 homes, with 1,900 customers still cut off – mostly in pockets of the Great Glen, in Fort William and on the Ardnamurchan peninsula.

The company said a “huge effort” to reconnect people continues “at pace” and that community volunteers were out assisting the most vulnerable people.

Ms Curtis told Good Morning Scotland that engineers were doing a “wonderful job” – especially those who had not seen their families since Saturday.

However she said there has been a lack of information from SSEN and that villagers felt they had to chase the company for updates.

She said: “They told me to travel to Acharacle for hot food which is just ridiculous.”

She later added: “You’d have to travel on a single-track road in the dark to get food.

“Plus everyone is running really low on fuel and by the time you get it back it’ll be cold anyway.

“Nobody has food, people haven’t had showers – it’s miserable.”

Villagers have been sharing a small number of generators among the sick and elderly, including one local who is living with Huntington’s disease.

Ms Curtis, who had her 56th birthday on Tuesday, said she had been living in her living room in the dark for the last few days.

Her own situation has been particularly challenging as she broke her leg five weeks ago in a crofting accident.

Locals are also diverting their limited personal fuel supplies to small businesses, who risk wasting hundreds of pounds of food if they cannot power fridges and freezers.

Staff at the local hotel, Mingary Castle, provided the community with hot food on Monday night before SSEN were able to arrange food supplies.

The BBC understands SSEN was unable to send a welfare van to Kilchoan because the vehicles are too large to fit down the road.

It has now made an arrangement with a local fast food van which will serve meals to locals at nearby Mingarry steadings and be reimbursed.

Ms Curtis said: “We’re being told Wednesday night is when we’re likely to be reconnected. We’re hoping and praying that’s not the case, that we might get back on today.

“We’ve got a lot of elderly and vulnerable people in our communities, so a lot of the neighbours have tried to help out, going round and making sure their neighbours are ok.

“But even people who are able to do stuff, they’re running out of fuel, they’re running out of food.

“We’re having to pull together ourselves which is very sad.”

On Tuesday morning, a spokesperson for SSEN said 20,000 meals had been served to those who were still without power.

They added: “We’re working hard to reconnect the final homes following the hugely destructive impact of Storm Amy at the weekend.

“SSEN expects the vast majority of those remaining homes without power to be reconnected by this evening.”