Nugget Point Lighthouse is a lighthouse at

Nugget Point Nugget Point ( mi, Tokatā) is one of the most iconic landforms on the Otago coast. Located at the northern end of the Catlins coast, along the road from Kaka Point, this steep headland has a lighthouse at its tip, surrounded by rocky islets (T ...

in the

Otago Otago (, ; mi, Ōtākou ) is a region of New Zealand located in the southern half of the South Island administered by the Otago Regional Council. It has an area of approximately , making it the country's second largest local government reg ...

region of the

South Island The South Island, also officially named , is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasma ...

of New Zealand.Nugget Point Lighthouse
,

Maritime New Zealand Maritime New Zealand (New Zealand Maritime Safety Authority) is a Crown entity and also a state maritime safety authority responsible for protecting the maritime transport sequence and marine environment within New Zealand and maintaining safety ...

. Retrieved 24 October 2012. It is owned and operated by

History

The lighthouse was built from 1869 to 1870 and first lit on 4 July 1870. The tower was constructed from locally quarried stone. The lighting apparatus that was installed had come to New Zealand on the same ship as the lighthouse designer James Balfour in 1863 and was originally intended for the lighthouse at

Cape Saunders Kaimata, or Cape Saunders, is the prominent headland on the Pacific Ocean coast of Muaupoko, the Otago Peninsula, in the far south-east of Aotearoa New Zealand's Te Wai Pounamu, the South Island. It is home to the Cape Saunders Lighthouse. Capta ...

. With the project on

Otago Peninsula The Otago Peninsula ( mi, Muaūpoko) is a long, hilly indented finger of land that forms the easternmost part of Dunedin, New Zealand. Volcanic in origin, it forms one wall of the eroded valley that now forms Otago Harbour. The peninsula lies sou ...

experiencing many delays, the lighting apparatus was used at Nugget Point instead. In 1901 Walter Hutton Champion was the lighthouse keeper along with his wife Alice. Originally, the lighthouse was powered by an

oil An oil is any nonpolar chemical substance that is composed primarily of hydrocarbons and is hydrophobic (does not mix with water) & lipophilic (mixes with other oils). Oils are usually flammable and surface active. Most oils are unsaturate ...

burner. In 1949 the oil lamp was replaced with an

electric Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described b ...

1000 W lamp powered by a local

diesel generator A diesel generator (DG) (also known as a diesel Genset) is the combination of a diesel engine with an electric generator (often an alternator) to generate electrical energy. This is a specific case of engine generator. A diesel compression-i ...

. The generator was replaced in the 1960s by a connection to the mains grid although the original

lens A lens is a transmissive optical device which focuses or disperses a light beam by means of refraction. A simple lens consists of a single piece of transparent material, while a compound lens consists of several simple lenses (''elements'' ...

for the light remained in place and continued to be used. The light was fully automated in 1989 and is now monitored and managed from a Maritime New Zealand control room in

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by m ...

. In 2006, the original light was replaced with an

LED A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits light when current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy in the form of photons. The color of the light (cor ...

beacon, powered by mains and backed up by battery. The lighthouse was solarized in May 2020 and now has no mains power. An easy 20-minute return walking track leads from the car park at the end of The Nuggets Road to a viewing platform right next to the lighthouse overlooking "The Nuggets". The lighthouse itself is fenced off.

References

External links

*
Lighthouses of New Zealand
''Maritime New Zealand'' {{Authority control Lighthouses completed in 1870 Lighthouses in New Zealand The Catlins Tourist attractions in Otago 1870s architecture in New Zealand Transport buildings and structures in Otago Clutha District

History

See also

References

External links