Peninsula started forming 700 A.D.
The Pelican Point peninsula is growing by about 18 metres a year. The start of the build-up of the sand bar must have occurred about 700 A.D. It is estimated that about a million cubic metres of sand is transported northwards along the west coast every year by wave action on the beaches to the south of Walvis Bay.
A former Regional Harbour Engineer at Walvis Bay, Mr. Fran Malan, who also served as the Deputy Town Engineer with the Municipality of Walvis Bay at one point in time revealed this in an article in the eighties in an issue of Harbour News.
Under the heading: “Walvis Bay’s Sand Bar Still Growing”, Mr. Malan posed the question how did Walvis Bay’s natural breakwater come into being?
This sand bar, he wrote, extends nine kilometers from the mainland into the sea. The bar varying in width from 500 to 1500 meters protects the commercial harbour, the fishing harbour and offers a potential for a harbour with at least 50 additional berths in the bay.
Malan’s article was used in Namib Times at an earlier occasion in its regular Beachy Bits and Pieces, written by the founding editor Paul Vincent.
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