Carysfort Reef Light
Carysfort Reef Lighthouse
|
|
 Florida
|
|
| Location |
Carysfort Reef Key Largo Florida United States |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 25°13′19.01″N 80°12′41.22″W / 25.2219472°N 80.2114500°WCoordinates: 25°13′19.01″N 80°12′41.22″W / 25.2219472°N 80.2114500°W |
| Year first constructed | 1825 (lightships) |
| Year first lit | 1852 (current) |
| Automated | 1960 |
| Deactivated | 2014 (active as daybeacon) |
| Foundation | screw-pile lighthouse |
| Construction | wrought iron tower |
| Tower shape | octagonal pyramidal skeletal tower with 2-storey keeper's quarter, balcony and lantern |
| Markings / pattern | red tower, white lantern and keeper's quarter roof |
| Height | 120 feet (37 m) |
| Focal height | 100 feet (30 m) |
| Original lens | first order Fresnel lens |
| Current lens | VRB-25 aerobeacon |
| Range | white: 15 nautical miles (28 km; 17 mi) red 13 nautical miles (24 km; 15 mi) |
| Characteristic | Fl (3) W 60s. with red sectors |
| Racon | "C" (—·—·) |
| Admiralty number | J2974 |
| ARLHS number | USA-143 |
| USCG number | 3-945 |
| Managing agent |
United States Coast Guard |
United States Coast Guard
Carysfort Reef Light is located approximately six nautical miles east of Key Largo, Florida. The lighthouse has an iron screw-pile foundation with a platform, and a skeletal, octagonal, pyramidal tower, which is painted red. The light is 100 feet (30 m) above the water. It is the oldest functioning lighthouse of its type in the United States, completed in 1852. Carysfort Reef is named for HMS Carysfort (1766), a 20-gun Royal Navy post ship that ran aground on the reef in 1770. The light is currently a xenon flashtube beacon.
The original Carysfort Reef light was a lightship named Caesar, starting in 1825. Caesar was built in New York City. While being sailed to its station, it went aground near Key Biscayne during a storm, and its crew abandoned the ship. The ship was salvaged by wreckers and taken to Key West, Florida. The owners bought the ship back and it was placed on station at Carysfort Reef. The lightship was often blown off-station by storms, and even went aground on the reef at one point. That first lightship had to be replaced after only five years because of dry rot.
The second lightship was named Florida.
Both lightships were captained by John Whalton, who at the age of 25 won his initial appointment as commander of the Caesar, in 1825. After the Cape Florida Lighthouse was burned by Seminoles in 1836, the Carysfort Reef lightship became the only navigational light on the Florida coast between St. Augustine and Key West. In 1836, Seminoles attacked Capt. Whalton and four of his helpers as they went ashore on Key Largo to tend their garden at Garden Cove, Key Largo. Capt. Whalton and one helper were killed, and two of the other three were wounded, but the three managed to escape back to the ship, where the rest of the seven man crew awaited, along with Capt. Whalton's wife and daughter, who at the time were visiting from Key West.
...
Wikipedia