Donal Hickey: Saving Skellig Michael — a global project to safeguard significant sites

This project will tap into experience gained from international culturally significant sites and the expertise of other heritage partners around the world

Location of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Skellig Michael is the most spectacular of all the early medieval island monastic sites. The monastery consists of six beehive huts, and is situated almost at the summit of the 230-metre-high rock. It became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996 and is one of Europe's better-known but least accessible monasteries. Picture: Valerie O’Sullivan

A clear, sunny day in October and the Skellig rocks rise like giant pyramids from the Atlantic, off the south Kerry coast. The sea is calm, perhaps deceptively so, with only a slight swell lapping the shore.

But winter is nearly here and conditions will change. The mighty rocks will be battered by wind and wave. Thoughts turn to the old monastery on Skellig Michael — a Unesco world heritage site and the most famous of the rocks.