Warnemünde Lighthouse is a

lighthouse A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of physical structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lens (optics), lenses and to serve as a beacon for navigational aid for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways. Ligh ...

situated on the

Unterwarnow Unterwarnow is the estuary of the Warnow River in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, northern Germany. It connects with the Baltic Sea in Warnemünde. The city of Rostock is located on its banks. References

Rivers of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania B ...

, the

estuary An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime enviro ...

of the Warnow river, in

Warnemünde (, literally ''Mouth of the Warnow'') is a seaside resort and a district of the city of Rostock in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Mecklenburg, Germany. It is located on the Baltic Sea and, as the name implies, at the estuary of the river Warnow (river ...

, a district in the city of

Rostock Rostock (; Polabian language, Polabian: ''Roztoc''), officially the Hanseatic and University City of Rostock (), is the largest city in the German States of Germany, state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and lies in the Mecklenburgian part of the sta ...

. The lighthouse has a height of and was put into service in 1898.

Planning

In 1862 it was decided to replace the old 8-metre-high storm lamp in Warnemünde with a new lighthouse. The construction of the lighthouse was officially approved in 1863, however, as a result of serious disagreement between its financiers, the town of Rostock, the district administrator (estates of the country: parliament of patricians and knights) and the

Mecklenburg Mecklenburg (; ) is a historical region in northern Germany comprising the western and larger part of the federal-state Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. The largest cities of the region are Rostock, Schwerin, Neubrandenburg, Wismar and Güstrow. ...

railways (the latter had owned the ferry boat route to

Gedser Gedser is a town at the southern tip of the Denmark, Danish island of Falster in the Guldborgsund Municipality in Region Sjælland, Sjælland region. It is the Extreme points of Denmark, southernmost town in Denmark, and also the southernmost poin ...

Denmark Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...

since 1886), the project did not actually start until 1897. It was commissioned one year later in October 1898. The building was planned and erected by the director of harbour construction, Friedrich Kerner.

Construction

33 posts were piled 11 metres deep into the earth to act as the foundation. The lighthouse has two cellars and the part above ground is 31 metres high and built of glazed white

brick A brick is a type of construction material used to build walls, pavements and other elements in masonry construction. Properly, the term ''brick'' denotes a unit primarily composed of clay. But is now also used informally to denote building un ...

and a number of bands of green brick. The

tower A tower is a tall Nonbuilding structure, structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from guyed mast, masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting ...

has two galleries used as panoramic viewing platforms for visitors. In the early years, the lighthouse lamp used

petroleum Petroleum, also known as crude oil or simply oil, is a naturally occurring, yellowish-black liquid chemical mixture found in geological formations, consisting mainly of hydrocarbons. The term ''petroleum'' refers both to naturally occurring un ...

and later

gas Gas is a state of matter that has neither a fixed volume nor a fixed shape and is a compressible fluid. A ''pure gas'' is made up of individual atoms (e.g. a noble gas like neon) or molecules of either a single type of atom ( elements such as ...

to generate its light. To begin with, the rotating

Fresnel lens A Fresnel lens ( ; ; or ) is a type of composite compact lens (optics), lens which reduces the amount of material required compared to a conventional lens by dividing the lens into a set of concentric annular sections. The simpler Dioptrics, d ...

assembly was propelled by

clockwork Clockwork refers to the inner workings of either mechanical devices called clocks and watches (where it is also called the movement (clockwork), movement) or other mechanisms that work similarly, using a series of gears driven by a spring or wei ...

, driven by a heavy iron weight sliding down a steel tube in the centre of the tower. Every evening, the lighthouse keeper had first to pump 90 litres of petroleum up to a tank at the top and then wind the weight up every two hours. Since 1927 it has operated electrically. The beam has an angle of over 180° and is focused by mirror reflectors on the land side. The light can be seen at a distance of about . The

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

or light pattern, which enables the identification of the lighthouse, is: 0,3 fl. -2,7 dark -0,3 fl. -2,7 dark -0,3 fl. -8,7 dark -0,3 fl. -8,7 dark. Each sequence lasts 24 seconds. Warnemunde Lighthouse by Bruce McAdam.jpg, Warnemünde Lighthouse Warnemuende Teepott lighthouse.jpg, Warnemünde Lighthouse The lighthouse can be climbed by a

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

spiral

staircase A stairwell or stair room is a room in a building where a stair is located, and is used to connect walkways between floors so that one can move in height. Collectively, a set of stairs and a stairwell is referred to as a staircase or stairway ...

. Until 1978 the lighthouse was run by a lighthouse keeper. Now the service has been centralized and is managed by the Sea Traffic Control Centre at ''Hohe Düne''. In the 1960s, the walls of the lighthouse started to show cracks. So in 1969, restoration started, a process that was not completed until 1993. Since then the lighthouse has been open again for visitors to climb to the top, something which is important nowadays for

tourism Tourism is travel for pleasure, and the Commerce, commercial activity of providing and supporting such travel. World Tourism Organization, UN Tourism defines tourism more generally, in terms which go "beyond the common perception of tourism as ...

. The lighthouse has a very active support group – the Warnemünder Lighthouse Society (''Warnemünder Leuchtturmverein'') based in Warnemünde. Most of its members act as voluntary guides for tourists.

Events

Each year a large lighthouse show with

laser A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word ''laser'' originated as an acronym for light amplification by stimulated emission of radi ...

light and music is celebrated on New Year's Day. The event is called "Lighthouse in Flames", and attracts around 10,000 people.

In popular culture

The official promotional poster for the 2010 film '' Shutter Island'' shows a lighthouse very similar to Warnemünde lighthouse in form and proportion, which also has two galleries. This has led to speculation that an image of the Warnemünde lighthouse was used for the advertisement.

References

* ''Denkmale und Erbe Rostocker Technikgeschichte'', Redieck & Schade 1995, * ''Cityguide'', Klaus Lass, Rostock / Warnemünde

External links