Owen Curran was born and raised in Falcarragh in the early 1960s.
Like many families in the area, his household was shaped by emigration. His father Joe left Donegal to work on the North Sea oil project, leaving Owen to be raised mainly by his mother. Owen was educated at Carrowcannon National School and later at Falcarragh Community School.
By the early 1980s Ireland was in deep recession. Employment was scarce, and the Troubles continued to destabilise neighbouring Northern Ireland, with occasional spillover incidents also occurring within the Republic.
As a young man, Owen felt pressure to contribute financially at home. Accordingly, he found temporary local work earning £40 per week, but the prospects were limited and unpredictable.
In 1979, following completion of the Sullom Voe oil terminal in the Shetland Islands, Owen’s father took up employment with Sir Robert McAlpine on the construction of Torness Nuclear Power Station on the East coast of Scotland. Torness was one of the final nuclear power stations to be built in Britain, part of the Advanced Gas Cooled Reactor programme and one of the most complex civil engineering projects ever undertaken.
A McAlpine recruitment call from Donegal
While home for the Christmas holidays in 1980, Owen’s father told him he would speak to Torness Project Manager Paddy McBride, a fellow Donegal man from Creeslough, about securing him a position. An offer followed. After passing stringent security and medical vetting, Owen joined the Torness workforce. His weekly wages rose from a mere £40 Irish punts to £210 sterling, a transformative change at the time.
Valued at approximately £1.9 billion by the late 1980s, Torness was among the largest and most controversial construction projects in Europe. In present-day terms, the cost would exceed £6 billion. At peak, approximately eight thousand workers were employed on site. A substantial proportion were Irish, with a possible 35% representation from County Donegal, continuing a long tradition of migration into British heavy civil engineering.
Donegal workers were widely regarded for reliability, stamina, innovation and practical problem-solving skills. These were qualities McAlpine depended upon. Over time, Owen became part of the company’s trusted core workforce, informally known as McAlpine Fusiliers, men retained on the most demanding and sensitive projects, where consistency, reliability and discipline mattered as much as technical ability.
Concreting in unbearable freezing conditions
Construction of Torness lasted nine years, from 1979 to 1988. The project comprised vast, heavily reinforced concrete structures, with sections up to one metre thick, built to extreme safety margins. Concrete pours were continuous. Twelve-hour shifts were standard, six days per week, with Sunday the only rest day. Owen worked mainly on the night shift.
Conditions were punishing. Temperatures regularly fell to minus seventeen degrees Celsius, intensified by relentless North Sea chill winds and the isolation of night work. Workers wore multiple layers and balaclavas to guard against frostbite. Maintaining concrete integrity under such conditions required strict quality control.
Concrete mixing water and aggregates were heated, non-chloride accelerating and antifreeze admixtures were used, formwork was insulated, temporary heating was installed, and freshly poured concrete was immediately covered to prevent frost damage. On a nuclear project, failure was unthinkable.
Owen, his father, and other McAlpine workers lived in an on-site accommodation camp. Standards were good for the era. Each man had a single room, proper washing facilities, and top-quality food. On Sunday evenings, many travelled to nearby Dunbar.
Even within this sealed and highly controlled environment, events beyond the site occasionally broke through. At 2 am on May 5, 1981, news of Bobby Sands’ death filtered quietly across the camp and into the night shift. Joe Walls from Inishowen threw his helmet to the ground and called for a minute’s silence. The entire site fell still, the only sound the distant echo of a diesel water pump.
Local tension, protest, and life beyond the site
Dunbar was an old military and naval town with mixed attitudes toward the project and the influx of Irish workers. While some locals welcomed the employment Torness brought to the area, others resented both the station and the presence of thousands of migrant labourers. Public unease around nuclear power had intensified following the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania in 1979 and grew further after the Chernobyl disaster of 1986.
Owen formed a relationship with a local woman. During a visit to her family home, her brother assaulted him and ordered him out using sectarian Fenian abuse. Her father intervened and made it clear that Owen was welcome if his daughter wished him there. Such incidents reflected the wider social tensions of the time.
The project also faced persistent protests. The demolition of old cottages and the scale of the development attracted large demonstrations, which site management had to handle alongside demanding construction and security obligations.
Workers were entitled to two weeks’ summer leave. Given the physical toll of the work, it was common for men to extend this through short-term sick leave arranged at home with their local Doctor. McAlpine was aware of the practice and tolerated it as part of sustaining a long-term workforce.
Loss, interrogation, and the weight of history
In early 1982, while Owen was working on a major concrete pour approximately one metre thick, he received news that his father had fallen seriously ill while home in Donegal. A cousin arranged a flight from Glasgow to Derry. This was during the height of the Troubles.
At Glasgow Airport, Owen was detained and interrogated by police on suspicion of paramilitary links. On arrival at Derry Airport the treatment was harsher. He was strip-searched, held and interrogated for so long that he missed his lift home.
Negative experiences like this were common for Donegal men travelling home from Scotland and England at the time. They are difficult to comprehend today, but they were part of the reality of working life back then.
Owen returned home to find that his father had died. While no definitive cause was ever established, years spent working in the brutal North Sea conditions at Sullom Voe on the Shetland islands would not have helped.
Torness itself stands as more than a construction site. It was built during the Cold War, under intense regulatory scrutiny, and against a backdrop of global nuclear anxiety. It became one of the last nuclear power stations constructed in Britain and symbolised the end of a domestic nuclear building era. Designed to operate for around forty years, it will now require managed decommissioning lasting decades, a reminder that nuclear generation is only a small fraction of an infrastructure’s true lifespan.
Pride, legacy, and a life built after Torness
When asked if he would do it again, Owen answers without hesitation. Yes. Becoming a McAlpine Fusilier was a badge of honour. He speaks highly of the company and especially of Project Manager Paddy McBride, whom he describes as a highly competent, respected and humane leader trusted at the highest levels within McAlpine. Paddy played a central role in delivering Torness despite immense technical, political, and social challenges.
Today, Owen works as a Site Foreman with Donegal County Council, a position he values greatly. It is far removed from twelve-hour night shifts in sub-zero temperatures on the North Sea coast, but the discipline, safety culture, and sense of responsibility learned at Torness remain with him. Owen has told his story in memory of his father, Joe Curran, who died in 1982. May he rest in peace.
Eamonn Coyle is a Chartered Engineer and Environmentalist
