Location | Cape Lookout (North Carolina), Carteret County, North Carolina |
---|---|
Coordinates | 34°36′19″N76°32′10″W / 34.60528°N 76.53611°W |
Tower | |
Constructed | 1859 |
Construction | brick |
Automated | 1950 |
Height | 163 feet |
Shape | Conical tower |
Markings | black, white |
Heritage | National Register of Historic Places listed place, NRHP contributing property |
Light | |
First lit | 1859 |
Focal height | 52 m (171 ft) |
Lens | third order Fresnel lens |
Range | 12-19 miles |
Characteristic | 15-second flash cycle |
Cape Lookout Light Station | |
Location | On Core Banks, Core Banks, North Carolina |
Area | 25 acres (10 ha) |
Built | 1857 |
NRHP reference No. | 72000097 [1] |
Added to NRHP | October 18, 1972 |
The Cape Lookout Lighthouse is a 163-foot-high lighthouse located on the southern Outer Banks of North Carolina. It flashes every 15 seconds and is visible at least 12 miles out to sea and up to 19 miles. It is one of the very few lighthouses that operate during the day. It became fully automated in 1950. [2] The Cape Lookout Lighthouse is the only such structure in the United States to bear the checkered daymark, intended not only for differentiation between similar light towers, but also to show direction. The center of the black diamonds points in a north-south direction, while the center of the white diamonds points east-west. [3]
It is the second lighthouse that has stood at this location, and is nearly identical to the Bodie Island Lighthouse, which has horizontal stripes, and the Currituck Beach Lighthouse, which is unpainted red brick. The more famous Cape Hatteras Lighthouse bears spiral stripes. The first lighthouse at Cape Lookout was completed and lit in 1812 at a cost of more than $20,000, which Congress authorized in 1804. It took eight years to build. [4] It was the fourth lighthouse to be built in North Carolina and was a 96-foot-high brick tower with wooden shingles painted with red and white horizontal stripes. However, it proved to be too short to light the treacherous Lookout Shoals, which were nicknamed the "Horrible Headland." [5]
The present lighthouse was completed and lit on November 1, 1859 at a cost of $45,000, which Congress approved in 1857. This lighthouse used a first-order Fresnel lens which allowed the light to shine brighter. On May 20, 1861, North Carolina joined the Confederacy and all of the lenses were removed from the coastal lighthouses and navigational beacons to prevent Union forces from using the lights to navigate the coast. Union troops captured the nearby Beaufort and Morehead City in 1862 and, by the end of the next year, a third-order Fresnel lens was installed in the Cape Lookout lighthouse. On April 2, 1864, a small group of Confederate troops under the command of L.C. Harland snuck through Union lines and out to the lighthouse. Their attempt to blow up the lighthouse was unsuccessful, however the explosion did destroy the lighthouse oil supply and damaged the iron stairs. With iron unavailable during the war, the damaged sections of the stairs were replaced by wooden ones. The Fresnel lenses from all the North Carolina lighthouses were found in 1865 in Raleigh. The lenses were shipped back to their original manufacturers to be checked out and repaired. In 1867, the temporary wooden stairs were replaced when iron once again became available after the war and the original first-order Fresnel lens was reinstalled. [6]
In 1873, the lighthouse was painted in its distinctive black and white diagonal checkerboard, or diamond, pattern. [4] There are those who believe the Cape Hatteras Light and the Cape Lookout Light paint schemes were reversed. This belief arose since the Cape Hatteras Light protects ships from Diamond Shoals and should therefore have the diamond pattern. [7] However, the daymark patterns were randomly assigned and there is no evidence to suggest that the Cape Lookout and Cape Hatteras patterns were switched. Diamond City, a community that once stood on the eastern end of Shackleford Banks, was named after the daymark pattern on the nearby Cape Lookout Lighthouse.
The lighthouse is part of the Cape Lookout National Seashore and can only be accessed by private ferry. During the summer, the Cape Lookout Light Station Visitor Center and Keepers' Quarters Museum are open. Though tower climbs were suspended in February 2008, [8] the lighthouse opened for climbing permanently July 15, 2010. The regular season lasts from mid-May to mid-September each year. During the open season, visitors are allowed to climb the 207 steps to the top of the lighthouse. [9]
On March 26, 2021, it was announced that The Cape Lookout Lighthouse would be closed to climbing by the public due to safety concerns. During a pre-season safety inspection conducted in January, officials found what they call serious concerns with the flooring, rails, as well as separations between the iron stairs and masonry, cracks in the iron landing plates and separation from the iron stairs and central support. The Cape Lookout Lighthouse Keepers Quarters Museum located near the base of the lighthouse remains open [10] and the National Park Service expects repairs to be completed by 2025. [11]
Historic Light Station information - North Carolina
United States Coast Guard [2] |
A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of physical structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lenses and to serve as a beacon for navigational aid, for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways.
Cape Hatteras is a cape located at a pronounced bend in Hatteras Island, one of the barrier islands of North Carolina.
Cape Lookout National Seashore preserves a 56-mile (90-km) long section of the Southern Outer Banks, or Crystal Coast, of North Carolina, USA, running from Ocracoke Inlet on the northeast to Beaufort Inlet on the southwest. Three undeveloped barrier islands make up the seashore - North and South Core Banks and Shackleford Banks. The seashore includes two historic villages on Core Banks, Shackleford's wild horses, and the Cape Lookout Lighthouse, which has a black-and-white diamond pattern. A visitor center for the seashore is located on Harkers Island.
Cape Hatteras Light is a lighthouse located on Hatteras Island in the Outer Banks in the town of Buxton, North Carolina and is part of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. The lighthouse's semi-unique pattern makes it easy to recognize and famous. It is often ranked high on lists of most beautiful, and famous lighthouses in the US.
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The Cape Henry Lighthouses are a pair of lighthouses at Cape Henry, the landform marking the southern entrance to Chesapeake Bay in the U.S. state of Virginia. The location has long been important for the large amount of ocean-going shipping traffic for the harbors, its rivers, and shipping headed to ports on the bay. The original lighthouse was the first authorized by the U.S. government, dating from 1792. It was also the first federal construction project under the Constitution, for an original contract amount of $15,200. A second lighthouse was built and completed in 1881 a short distance away after concern arose about the stability of the first. Both towers of the light station were designated a National Historic Landmark in 1970.
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Cape Hatteras National Seashore is a United States national seashore which preserves the portion of the Outer Banks of North Carolina from Bodie Island to Ocracoke Island, stretching over 70 miles (110 km), and is managed by the National Park Service. Included within this section of barrier islands along N.C. 12, but outside the national seashore boundaries, are Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge and several communities, such as Rodanthe, Buxton, and Ocracoke. Cape Hatteras is a combination of natural and cultural resources, and provides a wide variety of recreational opportunities.
Cape Lookout is the southern point of the Core Banks, one of the natural barrier islands on the Atlantic coast of North Carolina. It delimits Onslow Bay to the west from Raleigh Bay to the east. Core Banks and Shackleford Banks have been designated as parts of the Cape Lookout National Seashore.
The Outer Banks are a 200 mi (320 km) string of barrier islands and spits off the coast of North Carolina and southeastern Virginia, on the east coast of the United States. They line most of the North Carolina coastline, separating Currituck Sound, Albemarle Sound, and Pamlico Sound from the Atlantic Ocean. A major tourist destination, the Outer Banks are known for their wide expanse of open beachfront and the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. The seashore and surrounding ecosystem are important biodiversity zones, including beach grasses and shrubland that help maintain the form of the land.
Shackleford Banks is a barrier island system on the coast of Carteret County, North Carolina. It contains a herd of feral horses, scallop, crabs and various sea animals, including summer nesting by loggerhead turtles. It is a tourist and beach camping site.
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