Kimmeridge
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Kimmeridge is a small village in the Purbeck district of Dorset, England, situated on the English Channel coast. The village has a population of 110 (2001).
The village stands on Jurassic shale cliffs, and gives its name to the division of the Jurassic period in which the beds were laid down, because of the quality of the cliffs and the fossils they yield. It is part of the Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site because of the quality and variety of geological landforms along the coast. There is a Jurassic Coast Visitor Centre at Kimmeridge.
The Bay is also the Type locality for the Jurassic age Kimmeridge Clay formation, that is well-represented in southern England, and provides one of the source rocks for hydrocarbons found in the Wessex and North Sea Basins.
Beneath the cliffs there is a large wave cut platform and rocky shore, with good quality rock pools and variety of rocky shore wildlife.
On the cliff is a BP "nodding donkey" oil pump, which is the oldest working oil pump in the world, having been pumping continually since the late 1950s. The pump has achieved this by tapping into a network of connected reserves.
Directly east of Kimmeridge bay (above Hen Cliff) is a folly known as Clavell Tower which inspired P.D. James's novel The Black Tower, and is now in danger of falling off the retreating cliff, although permission has recently been granted to dismantle and rebuild the tower some 50 metres inland.
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