EUROPE'S largest military exercise has been taking place in and around Scotland.
More than 35 warships, 25 different types of aircraft and a multinational force of 13,000 personnel have been taking part in Joint Warrior.
British forces from the Royal Navy, Army and RAF have been taking part in the exercise along with personnel from the US, Netherlands, France, Turkey, Norway as well as Nato.
Ministers say Joint Warrior has provided realistic training platforms for ships, submarines, aircraft and ground troops in an area from the Irish Sea to Cape Wrath and the Moray Firth.
It emerged at the weekend that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has apologised for terrifying people living near the UK's nuclear bomb store at Coulport after setting off a series of explosions last week.
Residents of Ardentinny, near Loch Long, Argyll, where the Coulport armaments depot is based, heard 23 blasts in five days, which left them feeling as if they were living in a war zone.
The MoD said the blasts were part of a staff training exercise, but has refused to elaborate. It told residents there was nothing to fear.
The Argyll and Bute MSP Mike Russell has now written to Defence Secretary, Philip Hammond.
He said: "Coulport has been a bad neighbour and it needs to apologise and mend its ways. Many residents were very worried by the blasts, which were at times intense enough to shake houses. The fact that no warning was given and that there has been no adequate explanation makes the situation even worse."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article