Marstein Lighthouse ( no, Marstein fyrstasjon) is an active lighthouse in the municipality of

Austevoll Austevoll is a municipality and an archipelago in Vestland county, Norway. It is located in the traditional district of Midthordland in Western Norway. The administrative centre is the village of Storebø on the island of Huftarøy. Other vill ...

, in

Vestland Vestland is a county in Norway established on 1 January 2020. The county is located in Western Norway and it is centred around the city of Bergen, Norway's second largest city. The administrative centre of the county is the city of Bergen, where t ...

county,

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the ...

. It is located on the small island of Store Marstein just west of the island of Stora Kalsøy on the south side of the entrance to the Korsfjorden and therefore assists ships going to both the city of

Bergen Bergen (), historically Bjørgvin, is a city and municipality in Vestland county on the west coast of Norway. , its population is roughly 285,900. Bergen is the second-largest city in Norway. The municipality covers and is on the peninsula o ...

and to the

Hardangerfjorden The Hardangerfjord ( en, Hardanger Fjord) is the fifth longest fjord in the world, and the second longest fjord in Norway. It is located in Vestland county in the Hardanger region. The fjord stretches from the Atlantic Ocean into the mountain ...

Description

The Marstein Lighthouse currently consists of a tall square, white, masonry tower with a red roof, and a single-storey service building attached. The light sits at an elevation of above sea level. It emits a white and red

isophase light 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 ...

with a period of 4 seconds. The light has an intensity of 850,000

candela The candela ( or ; symbol: cd) is the unit of luminous intensity in the International System of Units (SI). It measures luminous power per unit solid angle emitted by a light source in a particular direction. Luminous intensity is analogous t ...

and it can be seen for about . A secondary light is located at an elevation of above sea level and that emits a red light,

occulting An occultation is an event that occurs when one object is hidden from the observer by another object that passes between them. The term is often used in astronomy, but can also refer to any situation in which an object in the foreground blocks ...

in groups of two.

History

The original

octagonal prism In geometry, the octagonal prism is the sixth in an infinite set of prisms, formed by rectangular sides and two regular octagon caps. If faces are all regular, it is a semiregular polyhedron. Symmetry Images The octagonal prism can also ...

-shaped lighthouse was built on this site in 1877. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, the island and lighthouse were occupied by German forces. Allied aircraft bombed the lighthouse on two occasions, 25 July and 1 August 1940, and caused considerable damage. From 1949 to 1950, a new square light tower, a new keeper's house, and a new surrounding, protective, bulkhead were built. The lighthouse was automated in 1987 and in 2002 the lighthouse keeper position was eliminated and the lighthouse is now controlled electronically from the mainland. In January 2005, a severe storm breached the bulkhead wall and destroyed the keeper's house. After the keeper's house was repaired its ownership was transferred to the local

municipality. A hotel now operates the facility as a dependency. The newspaper '' Marsteinen'' was named after the lighthouse in 1978.Våge, Nils Steinar. 2014. Marsteinen. ''Allkunne.no'' (February 28).
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References

External links

Norsk Fyrhistorisk Forening
{{Authority control Austevoll Lighthouses completed in 1877 Lighthouses in Vestland 1877 establishments in Norway

Description

History

See also

References

External links