Renovations to the Gay Head Lighthouse will take longer than expected after unanticipated damage was discovered in the lantern deck. 

In November the town started repair work to the lighthouse’s lantern deck, where the light sits, and curtain wall, which wraps around the top of the lighthouse. Crews are also replacing the existing lantern with an LED bulb which will flash the historic pattern established in 1874.

The expected completion date was pushed back from May 1 to June 10 after the crew found extensive damage to iron components in the lantern room, lighthouse keeper Chris Manning said Monday.

The town allocated $200,000 for the project at a special town meeting on Nov. 12. Mr. Manning said the unanticipated repairs will not require additional funding.

ICC Commonwealth is leading the charge on the restorations, the same company that moved the lighthouse a decade ago to protect it from a rapidly-eroding cliff. This is the first major renovation since.

The company disassembled all the iron components of the lantern deck and brought the parts to the Robinson Steel Company workshop in Norristown, Pa. for restorative work. The company had to strip decades-worth of caked-on paint off the iron parts.

“All of these iron components are over 150 years old now,” Mr. Manning said. “They’re all original to the lighthouse.”

The lighthouse was originally built for the Fresnel lens, which was elevated from the deck, said Mr. Manning. When the town installed an electric beacon in 1952, the original deck plate had to support extra weight, putting stress on the iron parts.

“They’re correcting a lot of that damage,” Mr. Manning said. “[We’re] just making sure that the job is getting done right and that everything’s getting repaired as it should be for the next 150 years.”

The tie-downs, or metal strips that secure the lantern room’s metal structure to the brick tower, also stalled the project. Once the renovations started, Mr. Manning said the construction company realized the tie-downs weren’t where they originally thought. 

The discovery meant the crew had to go back and re-evaluate their plans. The crew also had to remove more bricks that it originally planned, prolonging the project.

“All of those bricks are salvaged [and] they’re still on site,” Mr. Manning said. “It just required [that] we remove a little more than we thought we would in the beginning.”

The town plans to host a commemorative event for the lighthouse restoration on June 20, the details for which have yet to be announced.

Editor's note: a previous version of this article incorrectly stated the origin date of the historic flash pattern. It was established in 1874.