The phare du Portzic is situated on the north-eastern extremity of the Goulet de Brest

Goulet de Brest

The Goulet de Brest is a 3 km long strait linking the roadstead of Brest to the Atlantic Ocean. Only 1.8 km wide, it is situated between the Pointe du Petit Minou and the Pointe du Portzic to the north and the îlot des Capucins and the Pointe des Espagnols to the south.At each turn of...

 (Finistère

Finistère

Finistère is a département of France, in the extreme west of Brittany.-History:The name Finistère derives from the Latin Finis Terræ, meaning end of the earth, and may be compared with Land's End on the opposite side of the English Channel...

, France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

) and is the nearest lighthouse to the town of Brest

Brest, France

Brest is a city in the Finistère department in Brittany in northwestern France. Located in a sheltered position not far from the western tip of the Breton peninsula, and the western extremity of metropolitan France, Brest is an important harbour and the second French military port after Toulon...

. It was inscribed as a monument historique

Monument historique

A monument historique is a National Heritage Site of France. It also refers to a state procedure in France by which national heritage protection is extended to a building or a specific part of a building, a collection of buildings, or gardens, bridges, and other structures, because of their...

 before 1987. On the seaward side of the bottleneck entrance to the goulet, the lighthouse faces the Pointe des Espagnols

Pointe des Espagnols

The Pointe des Espagnols is the north-east extremity of the Roscanvel peninsula, an outgrowth of the Crozon peninsula closing off the roadstead of Brest...

.

It was built on military land in 1848, at the same time as the phare du Petit Minou

Phare du Petit Minou

The Phare du Petit Minou is a lighthouse in the roadstead of Brest, standing in front of the Fort du Petit Minou, in the commune of Plouzané. By aligning it with the phare du Portzic, it shows the safe route to follow for ships to enter the roadstead...

(started slightly earlier to the north of the Goulet. It was electrified in 1953 and automated in 1984 (though a semaphore post set up at its base in 1987 to regulate traffic in and out of the goulet is still permanently manned).

Characteristics

• Signals : 1 main light for the sector with 2 flashes every 10 seconds (2 second flash then 6 second flash), accompanied by 2 twinkling directional lights in the direction of the Goulet, one continuous (one flash per second, known as the North signal, indicates to a navigator that he finds himself to the north of the channel), the other with 6 short flashes (one per second) and a long flash, known as the South signal, indicating to the nvaigator that he finds himself to the south of the channel.