Qualla: Strumble Head Lighthouse https://qualla.com/strumble-head-lighthouse en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:13 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/h/r/strumble-head-lighthouse-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Strumble Head Lighthouse https://qualla.com/strumble-head-lighthouse Strumble Head Lighthouse: Introduction https://qualla.com/strumble-head-lighthouse/ Photo credit David James Ovens from St Peter Jersey Channel Islands, Jersey Channel Islands UK, CC BY-SA 2.0. The lens turns on mercury. At Strumble Head Lighthouse, perched on the rocky islet of Ynys Meicel five miles west of Fishguard, the great glass Fresnel lens floats on a bath of liquid metal, balanced so perfectly that a fingertip could spin it. The mercury bath was a Victorian engineering trick that reduced friction to almost nothing, allowing massive optics to rotate steadily for hours on a tiny clockwork mechanism. Most British lighthouses lost theirs to electrification and automation. Strumble Head, which received its electric light in 1949 but kept its original 1908 lens, still has the mercury, and the lens still floats.

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Image: David James Ovens from St Peter Jersey Channel Islands, Jersey Channel Islands UK | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/h/r/strumble-head-lighthouse-wp/gchr-strumble-head-lighthouse-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Strumble Head Lighthouse: A Long Argument with the Sea https://qualla.com/strumble-head-lighthouse/ Photo credit Pauline Eccles, CC BY-SA 2.0. Trinity House first proposed a lighthouse at Strumble Head in 1825, a year after the Royal National Institution for the Preservation of Life from Shipwreck was founded. The argument was straightforward. Ships rounding the Welsh coast bound for Fishguard or for the open Atlantic h...

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Image: Pauline Eccles | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/h/r/strumble-head-lighthouse-wp/gchr-strumble-head-lighthouse-a-long-argument-with-the-sea.mp3 0:06 2 full Strumble Head Lighthouse: Ynys Meicel https://qualla.com/strumble-head-lighthouse/ Photo credit Lesbardd, CC BY-SA 3.0. The lighthouse stands on Ynys Meicel, which translates from Welsh as St Michael's Island, a rocky outcrop separated from the Pencaer mainland by a deep tidal gap. The original means of reaching it was an iron footbridge with a handrail that doubled as a fuel pipe, siphoning paraf...

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Image: Lesbardd | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/h/r/strumble-head-lighthouse-wp/gchr-strumble-head-lighthouse-ynys-meicel.mp3 0:06 3 full Strumble Head Lighthouse: The Psalm in the Lantern Room https://qualla.com/strumble-head-lighthouse/ Photo credit nat morris from Haverfordwest, Wales, CC BY 2.0. Inside the lantern room, set into the wall where the keepers would see it each time they climbed the stairs to wind the clock, is a plaque bearing four lines of Psalm 127: "Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it; except the Lord keep the city, the Watc...

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Image: nat morris from Haverfordwest, Wales | CC BY 2.0

]]> Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/h/r/strumble-head-lighthouse-wp/gchr-strumble-head-lighthouse-the-psalm-in-the-lantern-room.mp3 0:06 4 full Strumble Head Lighthouse: The Invasion That Failed Here https://qualla.com/strumble-head-lighthouse/ Photo credit Lis Burke, CC BY-SA 2.0. Stand at Strumble Head and look out, and you are looking at the place where one of the strangest events in British military history began. On February 22, 1797, four French warships appeared off this coast, carrying 1,400 troops of La Légion Noire under the Irish-American command...

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Image: Lis Burke | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/h/r/strumble-head-lighthouse-wp/gchr-strumble-head-lighthouse-the-invasion-that-failed-here.mp3 0:06 5 full Strumble Head Lighthouse: Strumble VOR https://qualla.com/strumble-head-lighthouse/ Photo credit nat morris from Haverfordwest, Wales, CC BY 2.0. Pilots who fly the North Atlantic tracks know Strumble by its other identity. The Strumble VHF Omnidirectional Range, located near the lighthouse, is one of the boundary navaids for entry into oceanic airspace from the British Isles, and "Strumble" appears in flight plans flown f...

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Image: nat morris from Haverfordwest, Wales | CC BY 2.0

]]> Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/h/r/strumble-head-lighthouse-wp/gchr-strumble-head-lighthouse-strumble-vor.mp3 0:06 6 full