The Port Authority of the Bay of Algeciras (APBA) has put out to tender for an amount of €183,000 the first phase of the recovery project for the Fort of Punta Carnero, an 18th-century fortification located next to the lighthouse of the same name, in the municipality of Algeciras. The works will focus on the location, excavation, and consolidation of the emerging structures of the fortification, declared a Cultural Heritage Site, whose remains are currently semi-buried and of which only a few walls are visible that allow for the identification of the presence of the ancient military construction.
This first phase is financed by the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility through the 2% Cultural program and is integrated into the Conservation and Enhancement Plan of the Historical Heritage of the APBA (PCPVPH). The objective of the action is to carry out an archaeological excavation that will support the tasks of detection, identification, and qualification of the remains of the fortification, including the location of the immediate interior spaces to the visible emerging elements until reaching the pavement levels, in case they are preserved.
The results of this excavation will allow for documenting the exact location of the fort and its actual state of conservation, essential information to define the following phases of the intervention. Once this first stage is completed, a detailed topographical survey will be prepared that will serve as the basis for the design of later restoration works, with the final objective, contemplated in the PCPVPH, of recovering the fort and enhancing it to allow public visits.
The ruins of the Fort of Punta Carnero are located within the public port domain assigned to the Punta Carnero lighthouse, placing its conservation under the responsibility of the Port Authority. The site is located west of the Bay of Algeciras, at the gateway to the Strait of Gibraltar and within the Natural Park of the Strait, in a section of cliffed coastline that gives it a location of notable scenic and heritage value.
The history of the fort is directly linked to the fortification policy of the area near Gibraltar undertaken by the Government of Spain after the loss of the Rock in 1704. The fortification was built around 1730 as part of the system of artillery batteries located along the coast of the Bay of Algeciras, designed with the intention of protecting the city from possible British incursions and providing cover for the vessels seeking shelter in the port.
The fortification consisted of a horseshoe battery to barbette for six heavy-caliber pieces, equipped with a supply for gunpowder, a shed for provisions, and two guardhouses: one for an officer and twenty infantrymen, and another for a corporal and eight gunners. The complex was closed off by the opening with a wall facing an armed parapet for rifles, a configuration that responded to the military engineering criteria of the time for coastal defense.
The fort was destroyed in February 1810, just before the arrival of Napoleonic troops at the Campo de Gibraltar. The demolition was carried out in the context of the alliance formed two years earlier between Spain and England during the War of Independence, justified by the need to prevent Spanish fortifications along the coast from being used by the French army against allied interests in the Strait of Gibraltar. Since then, the remains of the construction have remained buried under layers of sediment accumulated over more than two centuries.
The tendering of this first phase represents the beginning of a process that, if completed in its different stages, will allow for the recovery of a culturally significant heritage element for Algeciras and the Campo de Gibraltar as a whole. The Fort of Punta Carnero is part of the defensive legacy that was deployed along the Algeciras bay during the 18th century and included various batteries and coastal fortifications, most of which have disappeared or are in a state of abandonment.