Gopalpur Lighthouse: the unsinkable rugged Indian lighthouse!

3 min read

2 years ago Ivan

We are in Gopalpur, a small Indian beach town, where a no-name lighthouse withstood two of the biggest cyclones in recent memory, and continues to stand silently on one of the quietest beaches in the world.
The small town used to be an ancient port which fell into ruin, but regained its importance to maritime trade during British colonial rule, and today it survives on fishing as its main industry, and a pristine beach with amazing views.
After the emergence of beaches in Goa, beaches in Kerala and Andaman Islands the popularity of this famous beach in fact declined during the 1990s. Before that Gopalpur was the most popular destination for both locals and tourists, a humming port town full of warehouses and factories.
As trade with Burma, now Myanmar, thrived during the colonial period, the town’s popularity as a holiday destination increased.
However, with World War II, trade relations with Burma stopped, shrinking the port’s importance.
After independence, the British left India, and with them the foreigners and Bengali traders and elite class left Gopalpur.

Overlooking the beach stands the Gopalpur Lighthouse, lone and imposing in its classic red and white stripes.
It is one of the oldest lighthouses in India, and It was commissioned by the British administration on the Sea Beach in 1871 when the first beacon, a wick lamp, was lit and hoisted on the eight meter high steel mast.
Storm warning signals were also hoisted on the same mast that stood on the lighthouse compound and other facilities were subsequently upgraded in 1892 and 1925, while the lighthouse as it stands today was commissioned only in 1967.
This was first of its kind between Kolkata to Chennai in East coast of India and a major landmark of the area, and its range is 26 nautical miles (1 nautical mile is 1.82 km).

However, like most structures on the eastern seaboard of India, it faces the seasonal fury of the Bay of Bengal, and this particular lighthouse has the somewhat curious distinction of facing two of the worst cyclones in recent memory.
The first being the deadly super cyclonic storm of 1999 that hit large swathes of the area with a top windspeed of 260 km/h and killed roughly 10,000 people.
More recently the tower was the sole witness to the onslaught of Cyclone Phailin, a Category 1 hurricane that made landfall here in October 2013, driving everyone to have to seek safety in shelters.
Everyone except the lighthouse staff, who stayed on along with their families, manning the wireless system to relay cyclone updates!
With the exception of some uprooted trees, the structure suffered minor damage and the staff and engineers were unharmed.

Still today the lighthouse serves numerous ships as well as the Indian Navy and Coast Guard as a radio beacon station and is open to the public.
The top of the structure offers an amazing 360 degree views of the once bustling port that is now a quaint and peaceful beach town.
The view from the top is splendid and one can see at a glance the entire town of Gopalpur, Gopalpur port area and nearby beach is Dhabaleshwar, which also houses temple of Lord Dhabaleshwar (Siva).
Its nearest airport is Bhubaneswar, 180 kilometers away.