The tower is 37 metres (121 ft) tall and there are 182 steps to the lantern which produces two white flashes every 20 seconds.

The light was automated in 1991 and is continuously monitored on-line from the Northern Lighthouse Board headquarters in Edinburgh.

[4] In 1813 the whaler Oscar was blown ashore in a storm into Greyhope Bay, at the entrance to Aberdeen Harbour.

The disaster had nothing to do with the lack of a light – the crew were drunk and incapable – but there were strong calls for a lighthouse to be built on the headland above the bay and this was achieved twenty years later.

Originally sperm oil was used in eighteen Argand burners giving a fixed light at the focus of a 21 inches (530 mm) diameter silvered-copper parabolic reflector.