Estevan Point lighthouse, Heritage lighthouse on Hesquiat Peninsula, Vancouver Island, Canada.
Estevan Point lighthouse is an octagonal concrete tower on the Hesquiat Peninsula, on the west coast of Vancouver Island in British Columbia. Eight external buttresses run along its sides and a red metal lantern sits at the top, sending light signals out over the open Pacific.
The lighthouse was established in 1909 as one of a series of buttressed lighthouses designed by engineer William P. Anderson, and it was built in concrete as a 30.5 m octagonal tower. A first-order Fresnel lens made by Chance Brothers of England was originally used; it and the lantern were dismantled in the 1980s and donated to a regional museum in 2004. The site was listed as a federal heritage building on 1 August 1991 and is covered by the Heritage Lighthouse Protection Act as of 20 December 2013.
The headland was named "Punta San Esteban" by the Mallorcan navigator Juan José Pérez Hernández in 1774, after he traded with the Nuu-chah-nulth people of the region. James Cook's expedition reached Nootka Sound four years later and made contact with the local population. The lighthouse stands in Hesquiat Peninsula Provincial Park, on the west coast of Vancouver Island.
The site has no road access; supply and visits come by boat or floatplane, and the light station is maintained by the Canadian Coast Guard. Annual rainfall averages about 3,097 mm, with November the wettest month, so waterproof gear is needed year-round. Fog and wind can close in quickly on this exposed headland.
On June 20, 1942, the Japanese submarine I-26, commanded by Yokota Minoru, fired 25–30 shells at the lighthouse and radio-direction-finding station but hit nothing. The first enemy attack on Canadian soil since the Fenian raids of 1866 and 1871, it prompted the blackout of outer stations, which hampered coastal shipping. A 1995 CBC Fifth Estate episode questioned eyewitness accounts and suggested a possible false-flag operation.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 93,772 contributors worldwide.