Cape Otway Lighthouse is a lighthouse on

Cape Otway Cape Otway is a cape and a bounded locality of the Colac Otway Shire in southern Victoria, Australia on the Great Ocean Road; much of the area is enclosed in the Great Otway National Park. History Cape Otway was originally inhabited by the Gadu ...

in southern

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada * Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory * Victoria, Seychelle ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

. It is Victoria's oldest working lighthouse. During winter to spring, the lighthouse is a vantage point for land-based

whale watching Whale watching is the practice of observing whales and dolphins (cetaceans) in their natural habitat. Whale watching is mostly a recreational activity (cf. birdwatching), but it can also serve scientific and/or educational purposes.Hoyt, E. 2 ...

as migrating

whale Whales are a widely distributed and diverse group of fully aquatic placental marine mammals. As an informal and colloquial grouping, they correspond to large members of the infraorder Cetacea, i.e. all cetaceans apart from dolphins and ...

s swim very close to shores. The government reserved the tip of the cape as the site for a lighthouse. Access to the site was difficult; it was eventually reached overland and construction of the Cape Otway Lightstation began in 1846 from stone quarried at the Parker River. The light was first lit in 1848 using a first order

Fresnel lens A Fresnel lens ( ; ; or ) is a type of composite compact lens developed by the French physicist Augustin-Jean Fresnel (1788–1827) for use in lighthouses. It has been called "the invention that saved a million ships." The design allows the c ...

; it was the second lighthouse completed on mainland Australia and it remains the oldest surviving lighthouse in mainland Australia. It was decommissioned in January 1994 after being the longest continuous operating light on the Australian mainland. At the keeper's cottages of

Apollo Bay Apollo Bay is a coastal town in southwestern Victoria, Australia. It is situated on the eastern side of Cape Otway, along the edge of the Barham River and on the Great Ocean Road, in the Colac Otway Shire. The town had a population of 1,790 at ...

, accommodation is available in two double studios or in the head keeper's cottage that will sleep groups ranging from two to sixteen people. A

telegraph station Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas p ...

was added to the site when

Tasmania ) , nickname = , image_map = Tasmania in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Tasmania in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdi ...

was connected to the mainland by a submarine telegraph line from Cape Otway to Launceston in 1859. Eight ships were wrecked along the coast of Cape Otway.Australia's Great Ocean Road
Shipwrecks
These included the ''Marie'' (1851), ''Sacramento'' (1853), ''Schomberg'' (1855), ''

Loch Ard Loch Ard (Scottish Gaelic: Loch na h-Àirde) is a loch, located in Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park, Stirling council area, Scotland. Overview The name of the loch comes from ''àird'', the Scottish Gaelic word for a ''promontory, ...

'' (1878), '' Joseph H. Scammell'' (May 1891), ''Fiji'' (September 1891) and the ''Casino'' in 1932. The first American vessel sunk during World War II, the SS ''City of Rayville'', was also sunk off the Cape by a German mine in 1940, which sank less than 24 hours after the British Ship S.S. Cambridge off Wilsons Promontory. The Americans built a radar bunker on the cape in 1942 which is now open to the public. The lightstation was decommissioned in January 1994 after being the longest continuous operating light on the Australian mainland. It has been replaced by a low powered solar light in front of the original tower whose focal plane is at 73 m above sea level. Its

light characteristic A light characteristic is all of the properties that make a particular navigational light identifiable. Graphical and textual descriptions of navigational light sequences and colours are displayed on nautical charts and in Light Lists with the cha ...

is three white flashes every 18 seconds. At the base of the lighthouse, there is a plaque remembering to one of the most mysterious UFO-sightings, the disappearance of Frederick Valentich on October 21, 1978, who had his last radio contact to Cape Otway Lighthouse

References

External links

Cape Otway Lightstation
- official site {{Authority control Lighthouses completed in 1848 Bass Strait Lighthouses in Victoria (Australia) 1848 establishments in Australia 1994 disestablishments in Australia Maritime museums in Victoria (Australia) Lighthouse museums in Australia Victorian Heritage Register Barwon South West (region)

See also

References

External links