South Sentinel Island is one of the

Andaman Islands The Andaman Islands () are an archipelago in the northeastern Indian Ocean about southwest off the coasts of Myanmar's Ayeyarwady Region. Together with the Nicobar Islands to their south, the Andamans serve as a maritime boundary between th ...

in the

Bay of Bengal The Bay of Bengal is the northeastern part of the Indian Ocean, bounded on the west and northwest by India, on the north by Bangladesh, and on the east by Myanmar and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands of India. Its southern limit is a line between ...

. It is long northeast to southwest and up to wide. At only , it is much smaller than its counterpart

North Sentinel Island North Sentinel Island is one of the Andaman Islands, an Indian archipelago in the Bay of Bengal which also includes South Sentinel Island. It is home to the Sentinelese, an indigenous people in voluntary isolation who have defended, often by f ...

and is currently uninhabited. The island belongs to the

Port Blair Port Blair () is the capital city of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, a union territory of India in the Bay of Bengal. It is also the local administrative sub-division (''tehsil'') of the islands, the headquarters for the district of South An ...

tehsil A tehsil (, also known as tahsil, taluka, or taluk) is a local unit of administrative division in some countries of South Asia. It is a subdistrict of the area within a district including the designated populated place that serves as its administr ...

in the

South Andaman South Andaman Island is the southernmost island of the Great Andaman and is home to the majority of the population of the Andaman Islands. It belongs to the South Andaman administrative district, part of the Indian union territory of Andaman an ...

administrative

district A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions o ...

, part of the

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

n union territory of

Andaman and Nicobar Islands The Andaman and Nicobar Islands is a union territory of India consisting of 572 islands, of which 37 are inhabited, at the junction of the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea. The territory is about north of Aceh in Indonesia and separated f ...

, neighbouring

Geography

South Sentinel is west-northwest of

Little Andaman Island Little Andaman Island (Onge: ''Gaubolambe'') is the fourth largest of the Andaman Islands of India with an area of 707 km2, lying at the southern end of the archipelago. It belongs to the South Andaman administrative district, part of the ...

in the south of the Andaman chain but south of its counterpart North Sentinel Island. From the limited information available it can be said that South Sentinel Island is a forested

coral reef A coral reef is an underwater ecosystem characterized by reef-building corals. Reefs are formed of colonies of coral polyps held together by calcium carbonate. Most coral reefs are built from stony corals, whose polyps cluster in groups. Co ...

. From a journal written in the 19th century, a Colonel Alcock who passed the island wrote " outh Sentinel israised a few feet and continuous with the corals surrounding it". The island lies southwest of

. It lies immediately south of the passage. The island is 44 m high to the tops of the trees and level topped. Its appearance is much the same on all bearings. A bank, as defined by the 36 m curve, surrounds the island and extends about northwest from it. Considerable depths exist in the channel between this island and Little Andaman Island.

Administration

Politically, South Sentinel Island is part of

Little Andaman Little Andaman Island (Onge: ''Gaubolambe'') is the fourth largest of the Andaman Islands of India with an area of 707 km2, lying at the southern end of the archipelago. It belongs to the South Andaman administrative district, part of the I ...

Taluk A tehsil (, also known as tahsil, taluka, or taluk) is a local unit of administrative division in some countries of South Asia. It is a subdistrict of the area within a district including the designated populated place that serves as its administr ...

. In 2018, the

Government of India The Government of India (ISO: ; often abbreviated as GoI), known as the Union Government or Central Government but often simply as the Centre, is the national government of the Republic of India, a federal democracy located in South Asia, c ...

excluded 29 islands—including South Sentinel—from the Restricted Area Permit (RAP) regime until 31 December 2022 in an effort to boost tourism. In November 2018, however, the government's Home ministry stated that the relaxation of the prohibition was intended only to allow researchers and anthropologists, with pre-approved clearance, to visit the Sentinel islands.

Demographics

The island is uninhabited but is sometimes used by diving expeditions on account of its remoteness and novelty factor.

Fauna

The South Sentinel Island

Sanctuary A sanctuary, in its original meaning, is a sacred place, such as a shrine. By the use of such places as a haven, by extension the term has come to be used for any place of safety. This secondary use can be categorized into human sanctuary, a saf ...

(established in 1977) is home to

coconut crab The coconut crab (''Birgus latro'') is a species of terrestrial hermit crab, also known as the robber crab or palm thief. It is the largest terrestrial arthropod in the world, with a weight of up to . It can grow to up to in width from the tip ...

s, which have otherwise been extirpated from most of the Andamans aside from

North Sentinel North Sentinel Island is one of the Andaman Islands, an Indian archipelago in the Bay of Bengal which also includes South Sentinel Island. It is home to the Sentinelese, an indigenous people in voluntary isolation who have defended, often by f ...

and

. Huge numbers of

pied imperial-pigeon The pied imperial pigeon (''Ducula bicolor'') is a relatively large, pied species of pigeon. It is found in forest, woodland, mangrove, plantations and scrub in Southeast Asia, ranging from Myanmar and Thailand, throughout Indonesia and east to t ...

(''Ducula aenea'') nest on the island; every March, thousands of them come from

South South is one of the cardinal directions or Points of the compass, compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Pro ...

and Little Andaman to nest on South Sentinel. Small numbers of

Nicobar pigeon The Nicobar pigeon (''Caloenas nicobarica'', Car: ') is a bird found on small islands and in coastal regions from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, India, east through the Malay Archipelago, to the Solomons and Palau. It is the only living member ...

(''Caloenas nicobarica'') also nest on the island. One globally threatened bird, the Andaman crake (''Rallina canningi'') also occurs on the island. It is also a very important nesting habitat for the

green sea turtle The green sea turtle (''Chelonia mydas''), also known as the green turtle, black (sea) turtle or Pacific green turtle, is a species of large sea turtle of the family Cheloniidae. It is the only species in the genus ''Chelonia''. Its range exten ...

(''Chelonia mydas''); large "swarms" of turtles used to be seen in the past, but they have been significantly reduced following extensive

poaching Poaching has been defined as the illegal hunting or capturing of wild animals, usually associated with land use rights. Poaching was once performed by impoverished peasants for subsistence purposes and to supplement meager diets. It was set a ...

by trawlers. Small numbers of

leatherback turtles The leatherback sea turtle (''Dermochelys coriacea''), sometimes called the lute turtle or leathery turtle or simply the luth, is the largest of all living turtles and the heaviest non-crocodilian reptile, reaching lengths of up to and weights ...

(''Dermochelys coriacea'') also nest on the island. Two large reptile species are found on the island: the Andaman water monitor (''Varanus salvator andamanensis'') and the

saltwater crocodile The saltwater crocodile (''Crocodylus porosus'') is a crocodilian native to saltwater habitats and brackish wetlands from India's east coast across Southeast Asia and the Sundaic region to northern Australia and Micronesia. It has been listed ...

(''Crocodylus porosus''). The Andaman Islands day gecko (''Phelsuma andamanense'') is also found on the island. There are no terrestrial mammals on the island aside from the endemic Andaman horseshoe bat (''Rhinolophus cognatus'').

References

External links