Here's when the giant yellow towers dominating Edinburgh's skyline are due to be removed
Giant yellow towers set to leave Leith in the coming months
They’ve been catching the eyes of Edinburgh locals and visitors alike for most of the year, but Leith's giant yellow towers won’t be with us for too much longer.
The huge structures, which are perfectly visible from Fife and have dominated Leith Docks since late February, will begin to depart over the coming months as they are transported to a major offshore wind farm.
What are they?
The 18 towers, brought here by offshore company Inch Cape, are wind farm parts. A 228m long ship docked in Edinburgh in late February ahead of the construction of components for a wind farm.
The three-legged lattice tower structures, known as jacket foundations, are up to 83 metres tall each - twice the height of the nearby Port of Leith Distillery at Ocean Terminal - and they weigh between 2,050 and 2,250 tonnes.
The jacket foundations will support the wind turbines at the Inch Cape site east of Arbroath, using a combination of both jacket and XXL monopile foundations for 72 wind turbines.
Jacket foundations are typically used where water depths are above 55 metres, and each one is designed to suit its specific location based on water depth, soil conditions and turbine size.
The installation vessel Alfa Lift, which has a giant crane to take on board each of the jacket foundations, will return to Leith this week to start collecting the pin piles which fix the jackets to the seabed.
When the 18 sets of pin piles are installed, the jacket installation will get underway, and the giant yellow towers will begin to gradually disappear from the Edinburgh skyline.
The last jackets are scheduled to leave Leith in early 2027.