The lighthouse is situated on a rock that is a tidal island with a causeway linking the lighthouse to the shore. A the tide rises, an alarm will sound as a warning to clear the causeway.
The tower was built to the designer Sir John Coode`s plans and was the first lighthouse in the British Isles to be built of concrete. It stands 62ft high with a beam that is visible some 33km away. La Corbière has been a graveyard for many ships due to the extreme tidal variation around this part of Jersey`s coastline.
There is a plaque adjacent to the causeway which commemorates the bravery of Peter Edwin Larbalestier, assistant lighthouse keeper, who sadly drowned on 28th May 1946, whilst trying to rescue a visitor to the Lighthouse, who had been cut off on the causeway during an incoming tide.
There is also a monument overlooking the lighthouse, sculpted by Derek Tristam, which commemorates the rescue of the French Catamaran “Saint-Malo” in 1995 which struck a rock 90 metres North of The Lighthouse in moderate to rough sea conditions. All the Passengers & Crew were rescued.
La Corbière once served as the Western Terminus of the Jersey Railway, with the first train running between St Helier & La Corbière in 1885. Unfortunately the service was terminated in 1935, due to being unable to compete with the more modern modes of transport that we see today. As a reminder to this part of Jersey History there is a trail, now known as “The Railway Walk” for both cyclists and pedestrians which links La Corbière and St Aubin and the former railway platform is still visible at the end of the Railway Walk.
The Railway was briefly used by the Germans during the occupation of the island to transport their coastal fortifications. This infrastructure was dismantled after the islands Liberation in 1945.
