• News
  • Film and TV
  • Music
  • Tech
  • Features
  • Celebrity
  • Politics
  • Weird
  • Community
  • Advertise
  • Terms
  • Privacy & Cookies
  • LADbible Group
  • LADbible
  • SPORTbible
  • GAMINGbible
  • Tyla
  • UNILAD Tech
  • FOODbible
  • License Our Content
  • About Us & Contact
  • Jobs
  • Latest
  • Topics A-Z
  • Authors
Facebook
Instagram
X
Threads
TikTok
YouTube
Submit Your Content
Uncontacted people reside on isolated island and attack anyone who comes near

Home> Community> Life

Published 13:31 17 Apr 2024 GMT+1

Uncontacted people reside on isolated island and attack anyone who comes near

The Sentinelese have made clear they do not take favorably to visitors

Emily Brown

Emily Brown

A community of uncontacted people reside completely alone on an isolated island and are willing to attack anyone who comes near.

Located amid the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Indian Ocean, the small forested island of North Sentinel Island is home to the community known as The Sentinelese.

The island is approximately the size of Manhattan, but unlike the Big Apple, North Sentinel Island is not open to visitors.

Advert

According to human rights organisation Survival International, The Sentinelese are the most isolated tribe in the world, and resist contact with outsiders so much that they have been known to attack anyone who comes near.

In 2018, young missionary John Allen Chau was killed after he attempted to make contact with the community in the hopes of converting them to Christianity.

As he first attempted to gain access to the island, the Sentinelese are said to have fired arrows at him as a warning.

John Allen Chau was killed trying to access the island. (National Geographic)
John Allen Chau was killed trying to access the island. (National Geographic)

Advert

Chau recalled the incident in his diary at the time, writing: "I regret I began to panic slightly as I saw them string arrows in their bows. I picked up the fish and threw it towards them. They kept coming.

"I paddled like I never have in my life back to the boat."

The group had 'a history going back tens of thousands of years of violently repelling anyone who steps on their island', but Chau didn't pay attention to the warnings, and on his third attempt to get on the island, he was killed by the community.

He was just 26 years old.

Advert

The reason the Sentinelese are so adverse to visitors may stem from the fate of neighboring tribes, which Survival International has said were wiped out after the British colonized their islands.

The community is averse to visitors. (Photo DigitalGlobe via Getty Images via Getty Images)
The community is averse to visitors. (Photo DigitalGlobe via Getty Images via Getty Images)

Another reason for their isolation may also stem from a visit from M.V. Portman, the British ‘Officer in Charge of the Andamanese’, with a large team in the 1880s.

The researchers came across an elderly couple and some children who were taken to the regional capital of Port Blair ‘in the interest of science’ - but the members of the community fell ill, and the adults died.

Advert

The children were taken back to the island, where the children are predicted to have passed on the diseases throughout the community.

Through their years of isolation, the group lacks immunity to common diseases that humans in more populous areas have developed treatments for, such as flu or measles.

If the community are exposed to the diseases, it could have disastrous consequences for their population.

Survival International has said that, from a distance, the community appear to be 'extremely healthy and thriving' - and all visits to North Sentinel Island are illegal, with area being patrolled by Indian Coast Guards.

Featured Image Credit: Indian Coastguard/NASA

Topics: World News, Science

Emily Brown
Emily Brown

Emily Brown is UNILAD Editorial Lead at LADbible Group. She first began delivering news when she was just 11 years old - with a paper route - before graduating with a BA Hons in English Language in the Media from Lancaster University. Emily joined UNILAD in 2018 to cover breaking news, trending stories and longer form features. She went on to become Community Desk Lead, commissioning and writing human interest stories from across the globe, before moving to the role of Editorial Lead. Emily now works alongside the UNILAD Editor to ensure the page delivers accurate, interesting and high quality content.

Advert

Advert

Advert

Choose your content:

a day ago
3 days ago
4 days ago
  • a day ago

    Mom-to-be slammed for naming baby after disaster that impacted millions of people around the world

    One social media user wrote that they 'refused to believe this is real'

    Community
  • 3 days ago

    Horrifying simulation reveals what really happened when man was swallowed whole by a humpback whale

    A new terrifying fear has just been unlocked, brilliant...

    Community
  • 3 days ago

    Hidden interview question could cost you that new job even if you are perfect for the role

    Don't get caught out...

    Community
  • 4 days ago

    Shocking simulation reveals how two inmates in separate prison cells had a baby without ever meeting

    Miami inmates Daisy Link and Joan Depaz had never met

    Community
  • Uncontacted Amazon tribe attack intruding loggers with arrows in 'humanitarian disaster'
  • People left mind-blown after watching Hubble telescope image of a star exploding over 10,000,000 lightyears away
  • World's largest 'uncontacted' tribe fatally shoot two logging workers with bow and arrow as others still missing
  • Tragic story of man who tried to contact ‘most dangerous tribe in the world’ on island people are forbidden from visiting