A baby has been born on North Ronaldsay, a remote Scottish island, for the first time in 34 years.
The baby, named Duncan Wilder Thorstein Traill Suarez Ford, was born on September 15 to Alice Traill Ford and her fiancé, Jorge Suarez, despite the family initially planning for the delivery to take place in Costa Rica.
North Ronaldsay, the most northerly island in Orkney, measures about three miles long and two miles wide.
According to Scottish government figures, the island had a population of 72 in 2024, although Traill Ford told CNN that 51 people currently live there.
The family, which has ancestral ties to the island, had return flights booked when they arrived, but Traill Ford said she changed her plans after reaching the island and decided to give birth at Holland House, a property built by her ancestors.
“I knew instantly that it would be the most special, magical and supportive birth that I could give him,” she said.
“My connection to the island is what brings me back every year,” she added. “Every year since I was a baby.”
“I feel this island had a hand in raising me and it’s for that reason that I felt the greatest sense of connection and belonging with the energy here, especially in my ancestral home,” Traill Ford said.
The birth has generated excitement among residents, whom Traill Ford described as a close-knit community.
“Everybody’s very excited,” she said, adding that she gave out small bottles of whisky decorated with four-leaf clovers and shells known locally as groatie buckies as good-luck gifts.
“They’re kind of extended family, it feels like… a giant family, island family, distant relatives,” she said.
Traill Ford attributed the long gap between births on the island partly to the absence of major healthcare facilities.
North Ronaldsay has no doctor or hospital and only has a resident nurse.
“I believe it’s because people feel maybe afraid of the things that might be able to go wrong in childbirth and so they feel safer being in a hospital where everything is available for the support that they may need in case something were to go wrong,” she said.
She added that reaching the Orkney mainland by boat takes about two hours and 40 minutes, while emergencies can require a coast guard helicopter.
“If you’re in an emergency then the coast guard helicopter would fly out for you otherwise if you’re well enough then you would need to travel into Kirkwall (on) the mainland,” she said.
