Great Lighthouses of Ireland

The story begins at Hook Head, a treacherous peninsula known locally as “the graveyard of a thousand ships” and then moves on to Eagle Island, an island notorious for its lethal weather conditions.

Often working in hostile and treacherous natural locations, Ireland's lighthouse engineers and builders used great ingenuity to achieve what seemed impossible.

Across both World Wars, lighthouse keepers acted as unofficial coastguards, keeping detailed logs of their observations and saving shipwrecked sailors.

A look at the future of lighthouses in the age of electronic and GPS navigation, and a former lighthouse keeper makes a poignant return to the Skelligs lighthouse.