Breasclete

Breasclete Lighthouse
Name:
Breasclete
Established:
1900
Current Version Built:
1900
Automated:
1900
Electrified:
BLANK
Height (ft):
16.4
Designer:
David Alan Stevenson
Operator:
Northern Lighthouse Board

Breasclete Lighthouse is located on Greinam Island in East Loch Ròg (or Loch Roag), a large sea on the west coast of the isle of Lewis. The small light is one of the rarer types of automatic types used by the Northern Lighthouse Board, built to the design of David Alan Stevenson. The early 1900s saw hundreds of automatic lights built to his designs spring up all over Scotland's many remote islands and headlands, each only requiring occasional maintenance and refuelling. Next to the tower there is a small maintainence/storage hut.

Unlike most lighthouses built in Scotland, this was a rather utilitarian design, whereby the lantern room and gallery were mounted above a large upright cylindrical acetylene tank which formed the body of the tower. The light first operated on 15th November 1900, exhibiting a mostly white light, showing red throughout a small arc roughly north-east of the island - this light flashed once for two seconds, followed by a four second eclipse. At some point the lantern was removed and replaced with a modern solar powered light on a pole, mounted on the top of the fuel tank body, although the light character remains the same as when the light first entered into service.

A number of these tank lighthouses were built, but few now survive, with only one remaining completely intact with it's lantern, on the small isle of Sgat Mòr at the mouth of Loch Fyne in Argyll and Bute. Located very nearby is the old Shore Station for the Flannan Isles Lighthouse.