Beruwala Lighthouse (Photo credit: ibrahim shareef, Google Street View)
Beruwala Lighthouse, also known as Barberyn Lighthouse (Sinhala: බේරුවල ප්රදීපාගාරය), is one of the lighthouses in Sri Lanka. It is located on 3 hectares of Barberyn Island located about 500 m offshore from the Maradana fish jetty near Beruwala town.
History
During the period of British Ceylon (1815-1948 A.D.), this lighthouse was erected (probably in 1928). It was operated by the Imperial Lighthouse Service until 1972, even after Sri Lanka gained independence from the British in 1948. The Sri Lanka Navy took over the control of the lighthouse in 1972 and in 1984, it was assigned to the supervision of the Sri Lanka Ports Authority.
The lighthouse tower
The white cylindrical tower is 110 ft. (33.52 m) tall and made out of granite. It has five stories and each contains two windows for ventilation. There are about 140 steps to the top of the tower. The embossed stones on the exterior wall of the tower have given it an appearance similar to the stone structure at Dondra Head Lighthouse in Matara.
A protected monument
The lighthouse at Beruwala belonging to Maradana village situated in Grama Niladhari Division No. 754, Maradana in the Divisional Secretary’s Division, Beruwala is an archaeological protected monument, declared by a government gazette notification published on 24 March 2016.
.Attribution
References
1) The Gazette of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka. No: 1960. 24 March 2016. p.1749.
Location Map
This page was last updated on 18 February 2023