The North Sentinel Island Iceberg | PART 1

There's no denying that North Sentinel

Island is world famous.

>> North Sentinel Island.

>> North Sentinel Island.

>> North Sentinel Island.

>> North Central Island.

>> North Sentinel Island.

>> And why is this 60 square kilometer

jungle covered island in the middle of

the Indian Ocean so famous? You know

why. If you ask anyone if they've ever

heard of that island with the

uncontacted tribe still living in the

Stone Age, they'll say yes. They might

not know it by name, but they'll say

yes. The people of North Sentinel Island

remain totally resistant to the modern

world and consistently refuse to allow

those of us living in it to impose

themselves onto their island. And what's

better at firing imagination than

something that's so completely off

limits? But contrary to what most people

would reasonably assume from the

constant usage of the terms stone age

and uncontacted in anything associated

with the island online, the islanders

are the furthest thing away from being

uncontacted. And they use iron tools and

have probably been doing so for

millennia. There's a shockingly long

history of outsiders encountering the

Sentinel East and attempting to coersse

the islanders into accepting their

friendship. But despite not being able

to communicate with us, the Sentinels

always make their position clear. It's

their island and we shouldn't be on it.

Their closest living relatives on the

larger islands of the Andaman

archipelago, which North Sentinel is

part of, have almost all acquiesced to

outside influence, though to differing

degrees. First, in the 19th century, the

British made the islands a penal colony

and attempted to coersse the islanders

into submission by both impressing them

with presence and with brute force.

After the islands were given to India in

the middle of the 20th century, the

Indians have attempted to coersse the

Andines into accepting coexistence with

the island's massive population of

Indian settlers with both presence and

brute force, though they have at least

tried to be a bit more compassionate and

protective. Either way, all the groups

that have opened themselves up to us are

worse off for it. They've contracted

horrible diseases. Their land has been

seized. Their forests have been chopped

down. Their pigs have been poached.

Their populations have dwindled. And

ultimately, their original way of life

so ancient it has no age is going

extinct. But that's not so for the

Sentinel. They're willing to accept the

odd gift now and again, or at least they

were. But if you overstay your welcome

and ignore their warnings to leave,

they'll riddle you with arrows. But even

despite that, I was completely blown

away by how much information there

really is about this island and how

fascinating and deep the history of our

ill- fated attempts at winning them over

really is. Even though it's just a tiny

little island in the middle of the

ocean, you wouldn't believe how deep the

story of this place goes. The iceberg I

made in my attempt at summing up

everything we know about the place is so

dense. And by the way, I'm probably

missing a lot that I'm afraid we won't

be able to cover everything on it today.

The video would just be way too long and

I've spent way too much time away to

justify making it any longer than it is

already. So today we'll be covering the

top half of the iceberg, a summation of

all the best known vignettes from the

island's history and all the baseline

information there is to know about the

Sentinel and their closest relatives. So

without further ado, let's begin. The

John Allen Chow incident 2018.

Heard anything about North Sentinel

Island? It's probably something

involving this incident. The needless

death of 26-year-old American

evangelical missionary John Allen Chow

when he attempted to preach the gospel

to the Sentinel back in 2018. It made

headlines all over the world and many

others have already covered the story in

way more depth than I ever could and

there's a lot else to cover. So, I'm

just going to go over the basic facts

focusing on what exactly he saw and

wrote about in the days immediately

preceding his untimely demise on the

island. Ciao was an avid outdoorsman

from just south of the border from me in

Vancouver, Washington. He was also an

EMT, a soccer player, a globe trotder,

and most importantly to him, a dedicated

Christian missionary. As such, it seems

that he was fascinated by stories of

adventure and survival beyond the limits

of modern society. You know, like

Robinson Crusoe and Hatchet from a

pretty young age, but he was especially

fascinated with stories of missionaries

contacting and converting remote tribes

in Africa and the Amazon. And in a dark

twist of irony, he was especially drawn

to the story of Jim Elliot, one of five

missionaries killed by Amazonian natives

in the jungles of Ecuador back in 1956.

After seeing that the people of North

Sentinel Island were listed as being

some of the last people on Earth who've

never heard of Christianity on a website

called the Joshua Project in high

school, an idea began taking shape in

Chiao's mind. maybe he could be the one

to share the good news to them and save

their souls. He later wrote, "The

eternal lives of this tribe is at hand."

At least that's what he seemed to think

since he also infamously referred to the

island as the devil's last stronghold,

which doesn't even make that much sense.

I mean, there's still pagans a bit

further east in the islands of

Melanesia. This idea grew and grew until

his goal in life was to live among the

Sentinel and convert them to his

particular brand of evangelical

Christianity. He even referred to this

as his burden. And in one of his final

notes, he thanks God for choosing him to

be his messenger even before I was yet

formed in my mother's womb. So, he

definitely had a sense of destiny, if

you can call it that. Contrary to

popular misconception, he was not a

Mormon. I know it's a bit surprising.

Anyways, regardless, the guy was ready

and willing to spend the rest of his

life on the island. He even assued

getting into relationships or having a

full-time job because of it. Eventually,

he even got in touch with a missionary

organization named All Nations based in

Kansas City, Missouri, and went through

missionary boot camp, which consisted of

role-playing as missionaries making

first contact with hostile tribesmen

played by the staff of all nations. as

if there were any world where that could

possibly predict how the Sentinel would

react to Chiao's presence. Chiao even

learned Kosa, a language spoken in South

Africa, to communicate with the

Sentinel, presumably based on his

assumption that an African language

would somehow be intelligible to them

because they're one of the last

representatives of the first wave of

humans to reach Asia from Africa in the

Paleolithic. although he did pick up a

few words in more local languages. He

even spent a whole summer studying

linguistics here in British Columbia at

the Canada Institute for Linguistics so

he could translate the Bible to them.

But I mean that's sort of a fool's

errand. As we'll see, there have already

been multiple instances of people trying

to communicate with the Sentinel using

the language of their closest surviving

relatives from some of the closest

islands to them and that hasn't worked.

So I don't think Kosa would cut it. And

as he would eventually and unfortunately

find out, the islanders didn't want an

outsider imposing themselves onto their

island.

Chiao traveled to Port Blair, the

capital of the Andamans and its oldest

city in mid-occtober of 2018 with fellow

missionaries. This was actually his

fourth trip to the islands, the first

being made in 2015. He spent the tense

days leading up to his trip to North

Sentinel lying low in a bungalow he

referred to as a safe house. in this

handwritten journal he made that's since

been released by All Nations at Chiao's

own request. It's an incredible but very

sad document and from here on out it's

our main source on what Chiao was up to.

In the safe house he prepared by

praying, exercising, reading and

gathering together his kit which

included picture cards and gifts for the

Sentinel as he was trying to persuade

local fishermen to take him over to the

islands and was waiting out a cyclone.

During this time, he went without direct

sunlight for 11 days. But he finally

found five fellow Christian fishermen

that he wound up paying $25,000 rupees

to or about $350

for the privilege of being fed to North

Sentinel. By the way, the reason why he

was lying low and had to pay the

fishermen so much is because the Indian

authorities strictly forbid travel

anywhere within five nautical miles of

North Sentinel Island, which we'll find

out more about later. And to make

matters even worse, he couldn't

communicate with his escort because they

didn't speak any English, and I guess he

didn't speak any Hindi. He finally

arrived off the island shores around

10:30 p.m. on November the 14th, which

he said was thanks to God himself hiding

us from the Coast Guard and many

patrols. In the early hours of the

morning the next day, he and two of the

fishermen made their first foray onto

the island. Chiao specifies that they

waited out into the shallows around the

northern curve of a cove on the

southwestern shore of the island,

probably near a place now since called

Allen Point. and they did so to stash

Cow's collapsible kayak and some gifts

for the Sentinel. Addendum. Actually, as

a quick correction, I saw the term Allen

Point being used on a map of the island

published in a book from 1990. So, in an

incredibly dark twist of irony, the

place where John Allen Chow was about to

lose his life shared the same name as

him. He remarked that the dead coral

that the ground is made up of was

extremely sharp. This coral used to be

well underwater but was uplifted by the

2004 Indian earthquake and forms a ring

around the island. The wreckage of a

ship, probably the MV Rley, which was

wrecked off the coast in the 70s, is

said to lie right near here on coral

that's since been uplifted. So, hey, at

least it wasn't rusty metal. I think

this ruddy stain on Google Earth is what

remains of it. But anyways, later that

morning, Chiao spotted and even hastily

drew one of the sorts of lean-to huts

that other expeditions to the island

have documented. These temporary leantos

are used as shelters that the islanders

and other related Andes groups used

during their hunting expeditions. And

the fact that fires have been found in

them, a detail which also seems to show

up in Chiao's drawing might also point

to them being the dwellings of specific

families. And that hut is where Chia

decided to focus all of his efforts. He

and the fishermen waved his hands in a

cloth to attract attention to

themselves, but it was of no use. The

fishermen were no longer willing to go

any closer to the island than half a

mile. So, Chiao retrieved his kayak and

nothing but black underwear, which he

thought would make the islanders more

comfortable with him since they always

go naked and with nothing much more than

a barracuda and half of a tuna, which he

plopped on top of the kayak as he rode

towards the hut. When he was about 400

yardds out, he began hearing some women

chattering in the distance and passed

some of the Sentinel's characteristic

dugout canoes, complete with outriggers.

But it wasn't long before he met with

some resistance. Two armed men with two

unstrung arrows each came rushing out

yelling. In one of the last entries from

his journal, he describes how he began

to panic slightly as the Sentinel strung

their arrows. So he threw the tuna at

them and hollered, "My name is John. I

love you and Jesus loves you. He doesn't

clarify whether he was using English or

Kosa, but either way, the Sentinel

obviously had no idea what he was

screaming at them and they kept coming.

So, after sliding the barracuda off the

prow of the kayak, he turned and paddled

like I never have in my life back to the

fisherman's boat. Though, he also

collapsed and stashed the kayak

somewhere in the reef again. Ciao was

frightened, but was mostly just

disappointed that the Sentinel hadn't

accepted him straight away. But still

determined, he returned yet again later

that same day, a few hours later, and

made landfall around the same hut on the

southwestern coast, where he brought out

gifts like scissors, cord, and safety

pins, fishing line, hooks, and rubber

hosing that he placed on top of a log

that he thought must have been placed

where it was by one of the Sentinel. In

addition to two groupers the fisherman

had just caught in the island's waters,

he also brought along an emergency kit,

especially for arrow wounds that

included things like abdominal pads and

forceps if he needed to ever extricate

any arrowheads out of his flesh, picture

cards for communicating, multi-tools,

and of course, multivitamins, his

passport, and a waterproof Bible like

this one. He headed towards what he

thought was a dilapidated or maybe even

destroyed shelter along the northern end

of the cove, hoping to encounter the

Sentinel again. But that area seemed

pretty devoid of life. So he headed

towards where he'd first encountered the

islanders a few hours earlier next to

that hut. Interestingly, he theorized

that maybe the dilapidated hut had been

built by poachers based on the fact that

he saw numerous rocky coral that jut out

of the cove having lines wrapped around

them. Half a dozen of the 10 bewildered

islanders in the hut began to shout. And

when Chiao tried in vain to repeat the

phrases the Sentinel seem to be yelling

at him, they just burst out laughing.

So, as he suspected, they were probably

trashtalking him. One of the only clips

of the Sentinel speaking is of one of

them screwing with a documentary crew in

pretty much the same way and then doing

this. Anyways, carrying on. They also

began yelling back into the forest, and

Chiao recounts hearing some kind of

drumming from within it. Then he saw

some guy wearing what seemed to be a

white crown made of what he thought

might have been flowers shouting at him

from a top the highest coral boulder in

the area. In the meantime, he sang some

worship songs and spoke some kosa, which

the Sentinels seemed to tolerate for a

moment in silence. At some point, he

even used some phrases in Jara spoken by

some of the Sentinel's closest relatives

on the island of South Andaman, which is

actually pretty clever and may have

actually worked in the past, as we'll

see. But nevertheless, they did not seem

to understand them. Two men did drop

their bows and began approaching his

kayak in their canoe, which they

propelled through the water with poles.

They initially ignored the gifts he'd

set aside for them on the log, but

quickly turned back to grab them. He

noted that if they see something they

like, they'll take it by force if

necessary. I wonder how many other folks

have given them something, and if they

feel like it's expected or do them, by

the way, he was right in thinking that.

But regardless of Chiao's gifts, the

Sentinel seemed to be reaching the limit

of what they could tolerate, and things

soon went south. He heard some more

yelling as a boy and a young woman

appeared behind the men who just

received the gifts with their bows

drawn. Chiao says, "I kept waving my

hands to say no bows, but they didn't

get the message, I guess." He tossed his

last gift, what he describes as a shovel

or ads, midway between him and the

islanders. But even though the ads is

the Sentinel's tool of choice, it didn't

make much of an impact. Soon, the

Sentinel had almost encircled him. One

unarmed man blocked his exit. Another

came forward with a knife. So he figured

this was it and decided that this would

be the ideal time to start preaching

from Genesis and stepped out of his

kayak to show that I too have legs as if

that's why they wanted him gone. At this

point, one of the men was just mere

inches from him. and he noticed that he

had yellowish pigment in circles on his

cheeks, which interestingly does mirror

the practices of the Sentinel's closest

relatives, the Enis, and matches 19th

century descriptions of the Sentinel

themselves. But then the next thing he

knew, a boy he estimated to be about 10

years old had shot an arrow right into

his Bible, which he was holding over his

chest. Chowo saw that the arrow head was

metal, thin, but very sharp, which

matches how arrows fired at Indian

officials in the 80s were described as

needleike and made of iron. Chiao wrote,

"I stumbled back, and I recall yelling

at the kid for shooting me, but he

decided to ignore the obvious and put an

optimistic spin on things. Now, as I

look back at it, my Bible cover looks

like bark, like tree bark. So maybe he

was just curious. But yikes, it just

gave me a fright." But he still couldn't

escape feeling crushed. In one of his

final messages, he wrote, "I've never

felt this much grief or sorrow. Why, in

all caps, why did a little kid have to

shoot me today? His high-pitched voice

still lingers in my head." He even

theorized that the Sentinel's hostility

arose from ancestral memories of

escaping from some slaveship, and

without thinking, Chow tossed the

arrowhead back to the kid, which he

later regretfully wrote about. But as

they've done in the past with others,

the Sentinel let him off with a warning

yet again and left him alone as they let

him swim the mile or so to the

fisherman's boat since they did decide

to impound his kayak. As he was watching

the sunset, he wrote, wondering if it'll

be the last sunset I see before being in

the place where the sun never sets. Why

does this beautiful place have to have

so much death? I hope this isn't one of

my last notes, but if it is, to God be

the glory. He was last seen alive by the

fisherman the next day. He decided to be

dropped off alone near one of the caches

he'd made. And from there, he'd walked

down the beach to the same hut he'd just

come from. He deliberately decided to

meet the Sentinel without the

fisherman's boat nearby and wrote that

he only intended for them to return the

following night because he thought that

maybe the presence of the boat was

spooking the Sentinel. He even mentioned

how he knew of a fellow missionary who'd

successfully met with one of the

Sentinel's relatives, the Jara, with no

boat nearby. But he had another reason

for this. If he was killed, then at

least the fisherman wouldn't have to

bear witness to it. Apparently, those

two points made him feel at peace with

the whole plan. The following morning,

Chiao would launch his third and final

attempt at approaching the Islanders

after writing a final three-page journal

entry in pencil, mostly consisting of

farewell messages to his family and

friends, writing, "You guys might think

I'm crazy in all this, but I think it's

worth it to declare Jesus's name. Please

do not be angry with them or at God, and

that the eternal lives of this tribe is

at hand, and I can't wait to see them

around the throne."

A day or so later, after returning from

their normal fishing routine, the

fisherman complicit in illegally fing

Chow to the island watched as his

lifeless body was dragged along the

beach with a rope and buried. According

to an email sent by a fellow missionary

to Chiao's mother. He was never to be

seen again. The Indian authorities have

since prosecuted seven people involved

in this, but the question over what, if

anything, should be done for Chia's

remains still lingers. A helicopter was

sent to assess the situation on the 20th

of November. And on the 24th, a boat

filled with local policemen came to the

site of Chiao's death, hoping to procure

the body. They wisely maintained a

distance of some 400 m away from the

beach where they stared down the

Sentinel in a tense standoff. Nothing

more was done, and frankly, it should

probably stay that way. A murder case

was opened, but that's understandably

been heavily criticized. And it's not

like any of the Sentinel are ever going

to be arrested for this. and Chiao

himself wrote, "Don't retrieve my body."

Different people have reacted to Chiao's

failed mission in wildly different ways.

Some of his fellow missionaries praise

him as a martyr, and most others call

him an idiot, but I personally don't

think he's either. I do truly admire

that he was so committed to his dream

and to serving something bigger than

himself that he was willing to and did

perish for it. But at the same time, his

very presence on the island put the

people he was trying to help in mortal

danger. Admittedly, he was vaccinated

for 13 different illnesses and

quarantined himself before going to the

island, but who knows what pathogens he

could have and maybe did unwittingly

transferred to them. As we'll see, their

relatives on the larger and more

populous Andammens were completely

decimated by horrible diseases

unwittingly brought by the British and

some may have even already gotten to the

island. So, these people have no

immunity to diseases we don't even think

about anymore. But the main flaw with

Chiao's idea was just the fact that he

didn't do his research. I mean, he did

research. He compiled a giant dossier on

his plans to ingratiate himself with the

Sentinel, complete with a map of safe

landing sites, but he just chose to

ignore so many aspects of the island's

historical context. First, the islanders

have never allowed outsiders to stay on

their island without either a melting

into the island's dense jungle interior

to wait for the right moment to strike

or b immediately confronting the

trespasser with a hail of arrows. Though

for a brief period in the early 90s that

wasn't the case and there was some

friendly contact between outside parties

and the Sentinel, but we'll get to that

at the end of the video. And the one

time a British colonial official named

Maurice Vidal Portman was able to force

his way into the interior without an

immediate response. In 1880, he forcibly

abducted an elderly couple and some

children. You know what happened to

those Sentinel that Portman kidnapped?

The two elderly people sickened rapidly

and died. And it's possible that Portman

abused the children in the worst way

possible. When Indian authorities again

penetrated into the island's interior in

1967, some of its less scrupulous

members raided the abandoned village

they came across for souvenirs. And

there's even evidence that the Sentinel

were the last recipients of a syphilis

epidemic that ravaged across the islands

in the 1880s. But we don't know who

spread it or how. Was it the British?

Was it contact with other And people

infected by the British? Or maybe it was

the Malay pirates that were accustomed

to raiding the Andamans for slaves. And

it's very possible that just as Chia

observed himself, the Sentinels may

still have to deal with the occasional

unsavory poacher or smuggler from

elsewhere in Southeast Asia. So, though

the untimely death of Chiao is

undoubtedly a tragedy, my point is us

outsiders have always left a bitter

taste in the Sentinel's mouths and we

always seem to go too far. So why should

they expect anything different now?

The drunk fisherman incident of 2006.

If you've heard anything else about

North Sentinel Island besides the

unfortunate fate of John Allen Chow,

you've probably also heard of the

similar fates which befell two Indian

fishermen who found themselves illegally

fishing in the restricted waters

surrounding the island, which

unfortunately meant that they didn't see

the end of January 2006. Back in 1956,

the Indian government passed the Andaman

and Nicabar Islands Protection of

Aboriginal Tribes Act, which banned

private visits to the island and forbid

any boats from getting closer than five

nautical miles from it. Mostly to spare

the Sentinel from the contagious

diseases we outsiders would inevitably

transfer to them. Though that of course

didn't stop official visits to them. But

anyways, this exclusion zone is

regularly patrolled by the Indian Navy

and Coast Guard, at least ostensibly.

Later on, we'll see that it's a bit more

porous than it should be, and the same

kind of small fishing boat these two

fishermen were piloting had become a

common sight off the island in the late

'9s, with residents of nearby Port Blair

looking to privately take part in

dismantling the cargo ships rotting on

the reefs there. But what happened to

these two fishermen seems like a pretty

clear sign that to the Sentinel they

were far from welcome. Sundur Raj and

Pundit Tawari were two ex-cons that

somehow became friends in prison despite

going there for very different reasons.

Raj had murdered his ex-wife and Tawari

had been jailed for petty theft. After

being released, they bought a fishing

dink using money reportedly dubiously

siphoned off from the aid money sent to

the islands after it was devastated by

the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. A couple

years later, in January of 2006, the two

men joined a convoy of ships fishing in

the exclusion zone off North Sentinel

after setting off from nearby Wandor. At

some point, they reportedly got drunk on

palm wine and fell asleep. And while

they were unconscious, their boat began

drifting towards the island. According

to the other fishermen there that night,

the two men were immediately encircled

by a body of Sentinel's men armed with

axes and were immediately killed, though

possibly after escaping the boat and

making a run for it. It's possible that

the reason for this was that they

aroused the Sentinel's anger by showing

up unannounced and by not offering them

any gifts since every other friendly

expedition to the island did so. And

there's a good chance that the Sentinel

have encountered other illegal poachers

that we don't know about and we have no

idea how that would have turned out. But

ultimately, we'll never know their exact

motives other than that these were

intruders. They didn't belong on their

island. There was at least one attempted

official giftdropping expedition made in

2005, but it had also been a very long

time since the last really friendly

encounters between the Sentinel and

outsiders in the early '9s. One

journalist also raised the possibility

that since there isn't actually any hard

testimony from the other poachers there

on account of them, you know, being

there illegally and being unwilling to

share concrete testimony and no

autopsies being done on the bodies that

maybe the two men had drunk themselves

to death before reaching shore. What

exactly happened to the bodies is a bit

muddled because different secondary

sources disagree about what exactly went

down. The Sentinel, for their part,

definitely weren't happy with the

helicopter that came round to inspect

the bodies. According to one source, the

pilot reported that they were just 200

meters away and were attacking my

helicopter with everything they had.

Arrows were flying everywhere. So, the

helicopter had to temporarily vacate the

area. Once it came back though, the

bodies were nowhere to be seen. But the

Sentinelis were still hanging around and

obviously still pretty annoyed. So the

helicopter crew drew the Sentinel away

from the rough positions of the bodies

by flying to the other end of the

island. When they followed it there, the

helicopter made a beline back where it

had first spotted the bodies and somehow

rediscovered them when its rotors kicked

up the sand the Sentineles had buried

them in. According to one source, one of

the fisherman's bodies was actually

recovered while the other had to be

abandoned. But a more recent academic

source reveals that the most the

authorities were able to do was show the

photos of the bodies, which it of course

never revealed publicly, to one of the

deceased's wives and alluded to other

family members being allowed to peek at

the bodies from a distance with

binoculars. The constrnation of the

local Indian settler community over the

government's failure to retrieve the

bodies was real, and some like Sundur

Raj's wife called for revenge against

the islanders. She threatened to take

her case to court and decried the

Sentinel as murderers. Bit ironic since

she married one herself, but oh well.

Conversations with the broader community

also revealed that they generally felt

that the Sentinel ought to have been

settled and made to work hard like them

so that their land could be put to

better use, whatever that means. So,

thank God the situation didn't boil over

into a hostile takeover because it seems

like it really could have at some point.

But Towi's family had the opposite

response though. His father said, "As

far as I am concerned, the Sentinel are

the victims in this, not my son. They

live in constant terror of heavily armed

poachers from Myanmar, Burma, and Port

Blair. They were only defending

themselves with bows and arrows and

rocks, and the only way they know how.

What I do want is my son's body so my

wife and I can cremate him. It is an

impossible case to prosecute." Anyway,

there was also some talk of mounting an

expedition to retrieve the bodies after

tensions had cooled down for a bit, but

that never went anywhere. And it was

only until I was writing this script

that I discovered that a repeat of this

exact thing happened at the tail end of

2023. This time, three fishermen, again

from Wandor, suddenly disappeared, with

the only clue to their whereabouts being

that their dinghy was spotted grounded

on the shores ringing North Sentinel

Island. This time there weren't any

bodies, but I'm pretty sure we can all

guess what must have happened. Though at

the time the family's reason that they

were still alive and talk of a rescue

operation was reported. For whatever

reason, this story doesn't seem to have

gone international like the one from

2006, but it's still a very interesting

case.

The Wreck of the MV Primrose, 1981.

Shortly before midnight on August 2nd,

1981, a Panameanian registered freighter

traveling between Bangladesh and

Australia, its cargo mostly consisting

of poultry feed and fertilizer, suddenly

ran ground on a coral reef just off the

northwestern coast of North Sentinel

Island. The Rex husk, though largely

broken up throughout the '9s, is still

visible on Google Earth and is

definitely up there as one of the

weirdest things visible from satellite.

So, you've probably heard about it

before. The sea was too rough for its

crew of 28 to lower their lifeboats. So

the captain opted to keep his crew on

board, which turned out to be a very

fertuitous decision given what was just

about to happen. After 3 days of just

sitting there, they finally caught a

glimpse of their Sentinel hosts. And

they did not look very welcoming. At

first, they confused them with a rescue

party, but that quickly changed when

they brought out some binoculars and saw

who they really were. Based on their

hostile gestures and the fact that they

were carrying bows and spears, the crew

of the Primrose quickly realized the

danger they were in and plunged into

panic. And the captain immediately sent

the following SOS message to their

bosses at the Regent Shipping Company

headquartered in Hong Kong. Wild men

estimate more than 50 carrying various

homemade weapons or making two or three

wooden boats worrying they will board us

at sunset. All crew members lives are

not guaranteed. Hilariously, a spokesman

from the government of Hong Kong said

the captain seemed like he'd gone

bananas. He also requested an immediate

airdrop of guns, which luckily doesn't

seem to have ended up happening. The

Primrose's crew kept up a 24-hour guard

with whatever perceivable weapons they

could find lying about, including a

flare gun, some axes, and some bits of

pipe. And even before the situation was

resolved, it became a bit of a media

sensation. And another spokesman from

the Indian government even had to deny

that the islanders were cannibals. We'll

see where that myth comes from in a bit,

but I can tell you that it involves

Marco Polo. After almost a week had

passed of this tense standoff, the

stranded sailors were airlifted off the

primrose in a helicopter that had to

make three different relays with a rope

ladder dangled down to them. Luckily,

the dramatic scene was captured in

photographs taken by the pilot, an

American named Robert, whose pictures

eventually wound up in this Durbagel

article. Apparently, the wreck was

initially like 400 ft off the coast,

right across from a little spit, but

given how much the island was uplifted

in 2004, which we'll get to, it's

basically right on it now. And if you

play around with the dates of the

satellite imagery of it, you can see

that either sea levels around the island

are rising or the boat itself is sinking

since from 2011 on, you can see it's

hull getting more and more submerged.

And what's even more interesting is that

the Primrose has a definite history post

this incident. And there are actually

eyewitness reports of the Sentinel

climbing up onto the boat with official

ship breakers on it and getting iron

from them. Which leads us to our next

topic,

the 20th century Iron Age myth.

And this leads me into one of the most

widespread myths about the Sentinel

East, that they didn't have iron until

shipwrecks like the Primrose started

running ground on the island's reefs,

which just isn't true. But I don't blame

you for not knowing that the references

to the Sentinel and other Andes groups

possessing iron tools is mostly buried

in really old obscure books and

websites. And before looking into them

for this video, I thought that too. I

even remember bringing it up as a fun

fact about them pretty recently. But as

I've also learned, the Sentinels destroy

every expectation you'd have of them at

every corner you turn. Despite their

extreme isolation, the Sentinel make

enormous iron arrow heads, knives, and

ads heads, which dwarf those of their

cousins on the larger Andamans. And for

context, an ads is like a sideways axe.

Its stone precursor was super popular

back in prehistory. And curiously, stone

examples were popular until relatively

recently in the South Pacific. Here's

some footage of the Sentinel using their

iron examples to rake in coconuts thrown

at them. I love how nonchalantly they

swing them over their shoulders. It just

looks so natural for some reason. Maybe

I have blood memory from the Neolithic.

Who knows? My weird prehistory based

fantasies aside, reports of iron being

in demand in the Andamans go back way,

way further than you'd think. When the

Chinese monk Singh was passing by the

islands, which he referred to as the

land of the naked people on his way to

India in the early 670s AD, he reported

that when the natives saw our vessel

coming, they eagerly embarked in little

boats, their number being fully 100.

They all brought coconuts, bananas, and

things made of ratan cane and bamboos,

and wish to exchange them. What they are

anxious to get is iron only. For a piece

of iron as large as two fingers, one

gets from them five to 10 coconuts. The

natives live solely on coconuts and

tubers. There's not much rice. And

therefore, what they hold most precious

and valuable is loa, which is the name

for iron in this country.

There is a possibility that he's

referring to the Champen people of the

Nicabars just south of the Andamans here

because he explicitly says that the

population was not black and the Andes

definitely are. But there's solid

physical evidence of iron being in the

Andamans in the form of an

unidentifiable piece of iron of unknown

origins found within the bottommost

layer of a site just west of Port Blair

called Chaldari Miden which dates to

2300 years ago. Also very much in line

with Ets's account, Arab travelers in

the 9th century recorded that when a

ship passes near, the men come out in

boats of various sizes and barter

amberress and coconuts for iron. Much

more recently, but still quite a while

back ago, in 1867, the captain of

another boat which ran ground on North

Sentinel's reefs, the Ninevea, reported

that the weapons that he and his crew

were at the pointy ends of were tipped

with what else but iron. Then later on,

a certain colonial administrator named

Maurice Vidal Portman, who we'll

definitely be rounding back to, noted

that the presents which the most

appreciate are hoop iron, rod iron,

files, sleeping mats, coconuts,

plantains, etc., etc. Now, these ones

are pretty universally recognized as

being the Sentinel's closest living

relatives. When an official Indian gift

dropping mission pushed its luck in

1974, the Sentinel fired an arrow at a

film director. The footage I'm using is

from what he was making, Man in Search

of Man, and it hit his thigh. Luckily,

it was only a flesh wound, but the

anthropologist accompanying them,

TrioNath Pandit, noted that it was a bit

of iron fashioned like a nail. He noted

seeing a similar arrow head that was

fired into the water and then retrieved

by its shooter in 1987. That same year,

he even spotted an iron arrow head that

he described as a trident. You see, the

Sentinel have very unique multipleheaded

arrows. And there's even one with four

heads in a major European museum, which

we'll get back to later. Of course, DK

Pandit, who we're going to be hearing

tons tons more about, by the way, also

became one of the only people ever to

walk inside a Sentinel village back in

1967 on his first expedition to the

island. The village was deserted, but he

observed a number of interesting

artifacts, including two stones

identified as grinding and hammerstones,

respectively. One bore traces of having

iron tools sharpened on it, and the

other was more rounded and even seemed

to have a built-in grip. The Sentinel

probably used these sorts of objects to

cold forge their iron into the tools

they make. The eyewitness accounts of

the Sentinel taking part in the

scrapping of MV Primrose in the9s adds

yet another dimension to all of this and

shows that they even have preferences

for certain types of iron scraps.

Probably because of how limited their

arsenal of ironworking tools is. The

following quote comes from one of the

five Mohamad brothers, a family of

shipwreakers based in Port Blair who

were officially auctioned the rights to

salvaging the wreck in 1991 and

routinely went back and forth to the

island for the better part of the '90s.

According to a fascinating interview

with one of them in 1993 by another

Indian anthropologist Vishvajit Pandia,

when I went with my workers to start

recovering and cutting out all that

could be recovered from the stuck cargo

ship, we were all worried. We were told

that Sentinel were far away, but we

still carried firecrackers short of guns

to scare the tribals just in case. On

reaching the location, it was evident

that somebody had been on the decks of

the partially submerged ship as we found

burnt firewood and used candlesticks and

paper wrappers and bottles. These were

obviously left by fishermen who came

aboard to gather what they could. After

2 days in the early morning when it was

low tide, we saw three Sentinel canoes

with about a dozen men about 50 ft away

from the deck of Primrose. We were

skeptical and scared and had no other

solution but to bring out our supply of

bananas and show it to them to attract

them and minimize any chance of

hostility. They took the bananas and

came up on board and were frantically

looking around for smaller pieces of

metal scrap, much of what our workers

had cut up with torch lights. The

welding torch was a major scare for

them, something we discovered every time

they visited us. We, however, would

oblige them with small pieces of iron

rod, but they preferred flat strips,

which we did provide them. They visited

us regularly, at least twice or thrice

in a month while we worked at the site

for about 18 months excluding the heavy

rain season. So like they had regular

close encounters with the Sentinel, but

hardly anyone knows about it because

nothing happened. The Sentinel weren't

hostile when their guests had something

valuable to offer them while they were

on their turf. Just think about it. The

Mohamads were literally in the exact

same place as the original crew of the

Primrose, but everyone was chill. The

Sentinel also use purely wooden arrows

and probably sometimes use stone or

possibly even beach glass as cutting

tools like their close but more

welcoming relatives, the Enis of Little

Andaman Island. So maybe the way they

use their tech will give us an insight

into how the Sentinel use theirs. What I

find really interesting about it is that

in addition to beach glass, they're

known to use the edges of shells to

shape wood. And because of that, they

noticed that metal gets more luster when

it's rubbed, just like the shiny abalone

inside shells. Vishvaget Pandia even

recounts that he was irritated by how

the Angi men he was with were constantly

rubbing their iron blades with a type of

wedge-shaped wedstone they call to jag

that they carry everywhere. And I love

this quote from the noise of the metal

scraping against stone is referred to as

yushia, a piece of anamatapia that is

also used to describe the call of the

dugong. For some reason, there's also

occasional reference to gold being on

the islands. Nicolo Ki in the 15th

century said the name Andamain,

obviously the precursor of Andaman,

meant island of gold. Though he didn't

have very many things to say about it

other than anyone who landed there would

immediately be torn to pieces. Eat Singh

explained to his readers that this

island does not produce iron at all.

Gold and silver also are rare. So, does

that mean they had it or not? But

regardless, a more important question is

how have they managed to get their hands

on a steady enough supply of iron to

justify making these large iron tools

for possibly millennia. The ships that

occasionally found themselves wrecked

off the island probably weren't enough

to supply the Sentinel with the iron

they needed, which raises the

possibility that they may have had even

more extensive relationships with

outsiders than we'd think in order to

obtain it. Although most medieval

mentions of the Andamans are pretty

explicit about how dangerous it is to

find yourself on them, maybe repetitions

of the sort of canoe to ship spur-of

the- moment trade deals each singing and

the Arab travelers describe were

happening on a more regular basis than

we'd think. But there is a third

possibility. George Weber on his

excellent archived site all about the

Andes outlines a really unique legend

the Andes have about how they first

encountered iron. The first man named

either Tommo or Dooku went on a fishing

expedition one day and shot an arrow. He

missed his target and instead struck a

hard substance that proved to be a piece

of iron. The legend states that this was

the first iron found by the natives.

From the new substance, Dooku made

himself an arrow head with which he also

scarified or tattooed himself. He then

sang a diddy to the effect that now that

he was scarified, nothing could strike

him. Weber raises the possibility that

this might be recounting the chance

discovery of meteoric iron since there

are no known iron deposits on the

Andammens. Though I think it might just

be referring to some piece of iron junk

that washed up on a beach somewhere.

Maybe that's another way the Sentinel

have been getting their iron. Though

then again, last time I checked, metal

doesn't flow too well.

Tsunami uplifting event 2004.

On Boxing Day of 2004, a devastating

tsunami ripped through the Indian Ocean

and hit the Andamans hard. Thousands of

Indians on the main islands lost their

lives and the rescue efforts were

painfully slow. Eventually, the Indian

government decided to dispatch a

helicopter to check in on the Sentinel,

expecting the worst. But when it flew

over the island, it found its occupants

alive and healthy enough to face the

helicopter down with their bows. Boats

also reportedly came by to see how they

were doing, but met with the same

response. And the pictures from this of

blurry uncontacted tribes people facing

down a helicopter with such ancient tech

fired people's imaginations the world

over. And prior to the untimely death of

John Allen Chow, the taking of these

photographs was probably the most

well-known vignette in the island's

history. And it's still a pretty

well-known story. But there's a bigger

picture. As per usual, the aerial survey

wound up citing 32 living Sentinel and

no casualties. But the earthquake that

created that tsunami completely changed

the makeup of their island and their way

of life must have changed with it. Parts

of the island were uplifted 1 to 2 m

while other parts sunk. Though generally

the shallow coral reefs around the

island dried up and even some small

outlying islands like Constance Island

just off its southeastern corner were

joined to the mainland. So North

Sentinel actually grew quite a bit. But

an expedition sent out to them in 2005

found out that wasn't exactly ideal for

the Sentinel. Vishvagget Pandia who was

part of it later wrote I realized that

the aerial photographs or the satellite

images could not convey the scale of the

change that had taken place. That's

because that extra land of theirs was

just a 70 to 150 foot wide barrier of

stinking sundried coral, which created

what seemed to be an impassible barrier

between North Sentinel's former beach

and the new coastline. I mean, would you

want to walk over the equivalent of 70

ft of Legos just to get your toes wet?

No. Though obviously that doesn't apply

everywhere on the island, and there are

still bits where the water is still

pretty close to the tree line. But this

has definitely thrown a wrench in the

sort of gift drops the Indian

authorities had been conducting with the

Sentinel since 1967. Pandia says now it

is not possible for the Sentinel to just

stand on the sandy beach and have a

visual contact with the contact party.

Neither is it possible for the Sentinel

to drag their canoes onto the sandy

shoreline and launch it into the sea. In

fact, during my 2005 visit, after a long

search, we did spot a group of six

sentinel standing and staring at us,

waiting for the Gunny bags full of

coconuts to be cast towards them. It was

practically impossible for them to come

towards the waterline. The bags of

coconuts were dropped, but the Sentinel

didn't manage to collect it, nor could

we deposit it for them. But they've

clearly been able to adapt somehow. I

mean, they're still out there, and they

certainly don't seem to want any help

from us. So good for them. And it's a

bit ironic that the Sentineles, as well

as their better understood cousins on

the bigger Andaman Islands, the Enis and

the Gerawa, managed to withstand the

tsunami better than its modern settlers,

despite how advanced they are in

comparison. Maybe the Sentinel had a

better understanding of early warning

signs modern people just aren't as

attuned to, like the movements of birds

and the behavior of animals, or just the

fact that the earth shook and the waters

receded for a moment. Both the Yongis

and the Giraa reportedly had the

intuitive understanding that they needed

to get to higher ground, deeper in their

forests because of their folklore

telling them to do just that when the

right signals came.

The zoo hypothesis.

This refers to the pretty popular idea

that the Sentinel are a real life

example of the zoo hypothesis. the

philosophical notion that Earth is just

a big zoo for super advanced aliens who

could otherwise easily wipe us out, but

instead opt to just watch our silly

antics for their own amusement instead.

And then I guess that entails maybe

occasionally visiting us up close to see

how we react. That seems to describe a

nature reserve better than a zoo, but

you get what I mean. It's pretty similar

to how we treat the Sentinel. And so the

Sentinel are often cited as evidence

that it's at least possible. And just

think of what it must be like from their

perspective. Yeah, I'm sure they

understand by now they were just people

like them, though early on some other

Andes did think of outsiders as

ancestral ghosts. They do, however,

constantly come into contact with

technology. They can't possibly fathom

wielded with ease by people whose

origins and motives and intentions are

totally inconceivable. Like, what the is

going through their heads when they saw

that guy's blowtorrch? And what do they

even think motorboats and cargo ships

are? Do they understand that they're

just bigger versions of the outrigger

canoes they use and the washed up

fishing dingies they're familiar with or

some kind of horrific mechanical monster

as some have suggested that just so

happen to die on their beaches once in a

while. No wonder they're afraid of us

getting too close. And they don't know

that the squiggles they see on the boats

people bring by or letters and numbers.

They have no idea how our weapons work.

They don't know why we leave gifts for

them. And they certainly don't

understand that pieces of colored paper

with more squiggles on them mean they

belong to India. It's a cool concept and

you know, hey, maybe it's true. I mean,

it would definitely explain all the UFO

footage that's been coming out. I guess

you might expect this entry to be

lowered down because of how

existentially freaky it is, but I think

in general it's one of the best known

things associated with the island.

The YouTuber incident of 2025.

Oh my gosh, what are we doing? These

poor islanders. This is the most recent

news story from the island, so tons of

other people have already covered it,

and it's still sort of a developing

story, so I'll be brief. In March of

2025, a 24-year-old small-time American

travel vlogger named Mlo Polyakov was

arrested by the Indian authorities after

landing on North Sentinel Island. He

didn't want to proitize to the Sentinel

or try to establish friendly

relationships with them. No, he just did

it for the views. It was just a

publicity stunt. And before this, he

even lared as Lord Miles and went into

Taliban controlled Afghanistan for the

same reason, uploading a moderately

successful five-part series on it to his

channel. The channel's name pretty much

tells you everything you need to know

about him, it seems. He got to the

island in an inflatable boat with a

Suzuki motor he assembled at a local

workshop attached to it that he launched

from a place called Kerma Dere Beach on

the western coast of South Andaman

around 1 in the morning. During his

5-minute long early morning foray onto

one of the islands beaches, he didn't

even meet any Sentinel. He just left a

half-drunk can of Diet Coke and a

coconut on the ground and collected some

useless sand samples. The footage on his

GoPro was impounded by the Indian police

anyways. So, in the end, he doesn't even

have a video to show for it. Although,

that might change. But other than that,

I really, really hope none of the

Sentinel's drank from that can. Imagine

how many diseases it could transfer to

them. For all we know, the islanders

might be suffering from a horrible

epidemic right now because of Polyov. We

don't know. And this wasn't even the

guy's first attempt at reaching the

island. In October of 2024, he tried

using an inflatable kayak to get over

there, presumably also from South

Andaman, but staff at the hotel he was

staying at, were able to stop him that

time. Then he visited the islands again

in January of 2025 when he illegally

recorded some of the Jarowa, some of the

Sentinel's closest relatives on Baratang

Island. But after this latest incident,

he was taken to a local court and

remained in police custody for at least

3 days. And there was some uncertainty

over where he was and what would happen

to his YouTube channel. But apparently

he's out because just three days ago, as

of writing this, he released a teaser

for an upcoming video about his stupid

stunt on the island, which consists of

footage of the island he took on a plane

above it. And interestingly, some of the

footage he took while on the boat

heading to or from the island itself. So

maybe he was somehow able to negotiate

the footage back. Or maybe this is from

his first attempt on that kayak. I'm not

sure.

How many are there?

The answer to this question, as with

most other questions us in the outside

world have about North Sentinel, is that

there isn't an answer. We just don't

know. But there are some rough guesses.

And by rough, I mean rough because the

estimates of how many living Sentinel

there are range from a measly 15 to a

whopping 400 and even 500 because again

they're all just educated guesses. A

2011 census says that the population

stands at a measly 15. TK Pandid, who I

think has to qualify as the world's

leading expert on the Sentinel because

he literally wrote the book on them

based on his interactions with them over

decades from 1967 to 1991. Guesses that

there were some 80 to 100 of them at the

time. That might not sound like a lot,

but even Pandit himself says that that's

an optimistic estimate and clarified

that besides the area of the island is

about 60 square kilmters, which would

normally support a population of only

about 40 in terms of hunting gathering

economy standards, whereby one man

roughly needs about 1.5 km of forest

land to survive. But that ignores the

fact that they have rich sea resources

all around the island. Pandit also

estimates that a single sea turtle

weighing 15 to 50 kilograms could

support a whole band of 20 to 30 people

for a couple of days. And in any case,

groups of up to 30 to 60 people have

actually been observed on the beach in

single encounters. But a lot of the

time, the expeditions Pandit was

attached to didn't encounter anyone or

much smaller groups of 2 to 12,

suggesting to him that they must keep

moving around in search of food and lead

a semi-nomadic existence. More recently,

another leading expert on the Sentinel,

Vishvajit Pandia, has a less optimistic

take based on his own observations from

being to the island three times between

1993 to 2005. And just the general

consensus among administrators in Port

Blair, he thinks the population stands

at about 40. And the historical

estimates he's collected, though

incredibly variable. And this 500 in

particular is incredibly unrealistic.

Shows a little bit of gradual decline,

which just seems so odd. Imagine if just

40 people are at the heart of all this

intrigue and fascination and controversy

and debate surrounding North Sentinel.

The Close Encounters 1991.

The Sentinel had been regularly visited

by Indian gift dropping missions, which

mostly just gave them endless bags of

coconuts throughout the 70s and 80s. The

islanders were mostly happy with their

gifts, but understandably didn't let

their uninvited guests get anywhere near

them. And when they overstayed their

welcome, the Sentinel would respond with

open hostility. But they finally chose

to break out of their shells a bit and

allowed the outsiders to get the closest

they've ever and probably will ever get

to them in 1991

when they willingly approached at least

two different Indian contact parties to

make handtohand contact with them. The

many encounters between the Indian

authorities and the centinles that took

place prior to this, which were

spearheaded by that anthropologist guy,

Trio Nath Pandit, are equally

interesting, especially since they

provide us some of our only peaks at

what lies inside the island's mysterious

interior. But I decided to leave those

juicy details for later because the

events of 1991 probably comprise the

best known amicable encounters between

the Sentinels and the modern world. On

January 4th, 1991, a giftdropping

mission was sent to North Sentinel

Island. Yet again, Pandit wasn't

involved this time, but his colleagues,

Madumala Chatadyay and Mr. SA Arawadi,

were along with a whole gaggle of

bureaucrats who competed to take part in

the expedition. They approached one of

the islands beaches in a motorized

dinghy launched from a ship named the MV

Tormugly which must have been a familiar

sight to the Sentinel because that same

ship had been routinely reused to ferry

contact parties to and from the island

for decades at this point since at least

1970. At first none of the Sentinel were

coming out but then a few of them

stepped out of the jungle and began

making gestures the anthropologists seem

to have correctly identified as pleas

for gifts. They also appeared unarmed,

which was somewhat unusual, though not

completely unprecedented. Instead, they

only carried some mesh baskets and some

of their giant adses, presumably to

crack the coconuts open. As the Indian

contact party threw their coconuts into

the surf, five of the Sentinel waited

into the water, and some others got into

one of their canoes to retrieve them.

The contact party gestured for the

Sentinel to come closer, but that's when

their usual caution kicked in. So, the

crew of the Tmugly went to lunch. They

returned that afternoon and witnessed

something remarkable. One Sentinel guy

started getting a bit fidgety with his

bow and arrows, but then some older

woman began reprimanding him for it, and

the visit commenced peacefully after he

ritually buried them in the sand. So,

the Sentinel sort of literally buried

the hatchet, at least for the time

being. This gesture signaled a great

many more sentinels to materialize out

of the forest and weighed to the dinghy.

And then they just began exchanging

coconuts handto hand. Ironically, one of

the people photographed doing this, SA

Aarati, a local director of tribal

welfare, had written a poignant argument

for leaving the islanders completely

alone almost exactly a year before. And

he wrote, "What right does the modern

man have got to interfere in the totally

isolated tribal life of the Sentinel?

What right does he have to decide

unilaterally to impose his friendship on

the Sentinel who has been vehemently

resisting it? Is it not their

fundamental community right to live

their own way which they have been

enjoying time immemorial? Pandit

attempted to replicate this kind of

close encounter just a few weeks later

at the same location perhaps with the

hopes of cementing their newfound

friendly relationship. his party were

greeted by another big group of

Sentinelis and they arguably got even

closer than before. In addition to

waiting up to the expedition's dinghy,

two Sentinel men even clambored aboard

it, which tends to happen during gift

drops to their cousins, the Giraa.

Pandit later told the BBC, "We were

puzzled why they allowed us. It was

their decision to meet us, and the

meeting took place on their terms."

Bandit even jumped into the water

himself, going neck deep as he

distributed coconuts directly by hand to

the Sentinel, when previously he'd

mostly just hurriedly dropped off bags

of coconuts on the beach, run off, and

then wait to see when the ever cautious

Sentinel would come out and get them.

According to Pandit, there was no threat

and no hostility. And he recounts that

for a few minutes he was alone in the

water, completely surrounded by the

Sentinel. But after Pandit became

separated from the main body of Indians,

the Sentinel made it all too clear that

they had had enough when a young

Sentinel man or boy made a funny face,

drew his knife out, and mimed cutting

Pandit's head off. So, seeing where

things were going, Pandit made the smart

choice to immediately get the dinghy to

pick him back up. He was familiar with

how the islanders tell people to screw

off. Later telling Indian Express, "If

we tried to venture into their territory

without respecting their wishes or got

too close for comfort, they would turn

their back on us and sit down on their

hunches as if to defecate. That was

meant to be an insult. If we didn't pay

heed and stop, they would shoot arrows

as a last resort." During past

expeditions to the island, he had also

witnessed the Sentinel firing off

warning shots from their bows that seem

to have been deliberately shot off mark,

even while their targets were well in

range. So, the Sentinel don't just

arbitrarily riddle trespassers with

arrows. They have the courtesy to give

him some due warning. But besides the

knife incident that ended this

encounter, it's remembered as being

mostly friendly and mostly characterized

by smiles and excitement. Despite how

exciting it was though, Pandock couldn't

help feeling a palpable sense of loss.

He later told fellow author Adam

Goodhart in the latter's New Delhi hotel

room, "They must have come to a decision

that the time had come. That they

voluntarily came forward to meet us, it

was unbelievable. It couldn't have

happened on the spur of the moment. But

there was this feeling of sadness also.

I did feel it. And there was the feeling

that at a larger scale of human history,

these people who were holding back,

holding on, ultimately had to yield.

It's like an era in history gone. The

islands have gone. Until the other day,

the Sentinels were holding the flag

unknown to themselves. They were being

heroes, but they have also given up.

Maybe he's reading a bit too much into

it there, but I think it's pretty

poignant. And because of the magnitude

of this occasion, or at least its

perceived magnitude, it's even been

reported that after the whole thing was

said and done, the debate over who first

touched the Sentinel became an

emotionally charged issue within various

sectors of the Andes administration,

where claims and counter claims were

sought to be established with

earnestness and vigor. The later 90s

would also witness the Sentinel's

closest relatives, the Jaraa, come out

of their jungle hideouts on mass to

initiate peaceful contact with Indian

settlers who they had hitherto had a

rather strained and even violent

relationship with. But for whatever

reason, it was almost simultaneously

decided that official gift drops to the

Sentinel would be put to an end. Though

what exactly was going on between the

Indian authorities and the shipbreakers

dismantling primrose and the Sentinel

themselves in the later 90s is really

murky and different sources contradict

each other about its exact end date.

Either way, the Sentinels haven't opted

to open up any further than they did in

1991. And I'm sure they're unfortunate

run-ins with fishermen and missionaries

and maybe the odd poacher and of course

YouTubers hasn't helped much. Addendum.

A Nat Geo article published in the

aftermath of Chiao's demise based on

Chado Padier's testimony reveals more

details I missed at first glance. Chad

Padier returned to the island a second

time with Pandit in February of 1991

with an even larger group than before.

And apparently the administration wanted

to make the Sentinels familiar with all

of them. Maybe pointing to the hope that

the islanders would open up to sustained

contact, though I'm not sure about that.

Chad Padier repeats the detail that one

or maybe multiple Sentinel climbed into

the team's boat apparently to take an

entire bag of coconuts and they even

tried to take the rifle belonging to the

police mistaking it to be a piece of

metal or maybe not. Who knows? And she

repeats the fact that the expedition

ended with a knife being drawn in a

manner similar to what Panda remembers,

but she added that it was only because

one of the team members tried to take an

ornament made out of leaves worn by a

Sentinel man. A few months later, she

embarked on yet another expedition to

North Sentinel, but poor weather

conditions spoiled it and they didn't

land. They didn't even see any of the

Sentinel. But I think the most

intriguing detail she adds is that

according to her, the reason why the

first expedition wasn't cut short by

arrow fire was because she spoke to the

Sentinel using some and words she'd

picked up while doing fieldwork among

the other tribes, which incited the

Sentinel woman to chastise her male

counterpart for aiming at the

expedition. But frustratingly, the

article doesn't specify whether she was

using or jarua and even what word she

used. But she did apparently overhear

what she thought was an identifiable

phrase in the Jarua language. Narella

jaba jaba, which okay, now that I'm

saying it out loud, it sort of sounds

ridiculous, but it very well could be

since that's only a quote unquote hunch.

Another recent article in nature, this

time from 2024, adds that a piece of

coral was thrown by one of the

Sentinel's men when Panda became

separated from the group, who were

apparently oblivious to what was going

on. It also taught me that contrary to

my previous assumptions, official

expeditions to North Sentinel Island are

still being launched, though they seem

to keep more of a distance now. They're

run by a wing of local government meant

to handle the welfare of the native

Andamese called the Andaman Adam Janjadi

Vika Samidi. A a JVS and they're only

meant to ensure the social well-being of

the Sentinel's people and to obtain

headcounts of them.

The Portland expedition 1880.

There's one traumatic incident in

particular that probably explains a lot

of the Sentinel's persistent resistance

to the modern world, but it didn't

happen in the 21st century or even the

20th century. It happened in January of

1880. And everything we know about it

comes from the man who instigated it, a

mysterious upper class British colonial

administrator named Maurice Vidal

Portman when the Andaman Islands were

still ruled by the British. He played a

big part in the island's story, visiting

it off and on from 1880 to 1895 and

crucially gave us some of our earliest

and most detailed insights into the

islander's culture and their

relationships with the other Andinees.

But that's near the bottom of the

iceberg, so you'll have to wait for

those juicy, juicy details. Portman was

born in 1860 to an aristocratic family.

His grandfather had even been a VIC

count, so he was sort of in the puridge,

but for whatever reason, he seems to

have severed ties with his family and

headed to the East Indies, where at only

19 years old, he was made officer in

charge of the Andes in 1879. He was

extraordinarily curious about them and

their lifestyle, though in a rather

strange, condescending way typical of a

Victorian. For example, he once said,

"In many ways, they closely resemble the

average lowerass English country school

boy." I don't know if that's a

compliment to the anime or an insult to

the English lower class or both, but

that's what he said. Portman was also

oddly fond of taking photographs of them

in different artificial and often poses.

So I should mention here that there are

allegations that he was a predator. But

other sources claim that he was

genuinely well-loved amongst the Andes

to the envy of other contemporary

anthropologists. But again, on the flip

side, he also ran these things that were

known as Andaman homes, which were

essentially orphanages meant to inject

British civilization into kidnapped

Andamean people. And he reportedly ran

them efficiently and competently for

longer than anyone else. By the time he

retired in 1901, he'd written multiple

books on the Andes, including a two

volume book entitled The History of Our

Relations with the Anime, which details

his different foray onto North Sentinel,

as well as a bunch of other stuff. But

his first expedition there, undertaken

only months after arriving in the

Andamans, is the best known of them by

far. I've heard it repeated again and

again, but often with crucial details

missing. And there's a reason why it's

the best known of them. It was

shockingly ruthless. But in order to

give you the full picture, let me read

what Portman himself wrote about it. I

can't do the accent I just did cuz it

would uh destroy my lungs. So enjoy this

other horrible English accent. Early in

January 1880, I paid a visit to the

North Sentinel Island with Colonel

Cattle. We saw tracks and villages, but

none of the aboriges. On the 26th of the

same month, I went again to the island

in the IGS Constants and stopped there

for a fortnight. Captain Allen and

Lieutenant Hooper of the Constants and

Lieutenant HH Doby of the European

Detachment Import Blair accompanied me

in making a very thorough search

throughout the interior of the island.

The villages, weapons, and utensils of

the North Sentinel people I have since

learned are exactly the same as those of

the Enis, and so far as I could tell,

their customs seem to be the same. One

day, while marching through the jungle,

we came upon a camp of Jarawas. then an

umbrella term the Sentinel fit under and

captured a woman and four small children

unheard. These were kept for a few days

on board the constants and the woman and

one child were then released with a

quantity of presents. The constants a

sailing schooter went back to Port Mowit

for a day during which time Lieutenant

Hooper and I camped on a small island

off the northwestern end of the

Sentinel. During the night, a bonfire

which we had lighted as a beacon for the

constants to steer by attracted a very

large number of sea snakes, hydrophus

species, which crept around us on the

sand, and as their bite was certain

death, effectually banished sleep. He

had a little bit of a sense of humor.

Anyways, a few days later, while

crossing the island from the southeast

to the western coast, Lieutenant Hooper

and I met on a track in the middle of

the forest, an old man with his wife and

child. Our party was spread out in

crescent formation, and the jaras came

to the center where Lieutenant Hooper

and I were. The old man had drawn his

bow and was about to fired left tenant

Hooper's head when my convict orderly, a

pathan named Amir, who had been

stationed at the right point of the

crescent and had got behind the jaras,

jumped on his back and spoiled his aim.

We caught the three unhe hurt and

brought them on board. The next day, we

took the six jar into Port Blair, where

I kept them in my house for some days.

They sickened rapidly, and the old man

and his wife died. So the four children

were sent back to their home with

quantities of presents. Remarkably, and

this seems to be left out of most other

sources that quote Portman, he actually

felt a little bit of self-awareness and

recognized that the mission was an

abject failure. Though he does throw his

fellow colonial Mr. Humphrey under the

bus a bit, this expedition was not a

success, for misled by Mr. Humphrey's

statements regarding the numbers and

ferocity of the aboriges, they were met

in a less consiliatory manner than was

desirable. and we cannot be said to have

done anything more than increase their

general terror of and hostility to all

comers. It would have been better to

have left the islanders alone until

theis of the little Anderman were tamed

and then to have approached them with

the assistance of the latter. The facts

which justify this view were not however

known at the time. Later after finding

an interpreter named Tomiti, he wound up

bringing him to North Sentinel in an

attempt at communicating which

ultimately failed. In addition to this,

Portman provides an almost unparalleled

glimpse into the island's physical

terrain, reporting that it's chiefly

composed of coral and limestone. Large

boulders of dead coral are to be found

on the surface all over the island, the

sharp edges of which make walking

difficult and painful. But it's clear

that he wasn't just making casual

observations and seems to have had some

ulterior motives in mind. The soil is

light and admirably suited for the

growth of coconut palms. The surface

drainage being excellent. The jungle is

in many places open and park-like, and

there are very beautiful groves of

bulletwood trees. Magnificent specimens

of the Bombas Malabaraka are to be

found. And interestingly, his account is

the only one that stresses the

Sentinel's close relationship with the

enormous trees they live around. The

buttress route of one was measured by

Colonel Cattle and found to be 27 feet

long and 15 feet high where it left the

trunk. Aides from advertising North

Sentinel as a potential coconut and

hardwoods plantation. He then goes on to

give a few really interesting remarks

about what the Sentinel themselves were

like. The Aboriges are few in number and

painfully timid. They resemble the Enis,

but of their language nothing is known.

Their food like that of the other

Andominees consists of roots, fruit,

fish, pig and turtle etc. And their

methods of cooking and preparing their

food resemble those of the not those of

the aboriges of the great Andaman. They

dig small water holes in the dry weather

and build leanto huts like those of the

jaras in the south and of theis but do

not make the large beehiveshaped huts

seen as permanent villages in the little

and among the sometimes they camp

temporarily in the buttress roots of

trees. I have noticed exactly similar

huts on the north sentinel the south

andaman rottland island the sank islands

and the south brother island. The North

Sentinel Islanders smear themselves over

with yellowish clay as do the Jerawa

tribes, but I have not seen them use red

earth on their heads, possibly because

this pigment is not found on their

island. For reference, the Angi put red

earth on their closely shaved heads.

This group of tribes do not wear the

skulls of their deceased relatives,

which is what the great Andes do. But I

have found both on the North Sentinel

and on the little Anderman the lower

jawbones of men, ornamented with a

fringe of twisted fiber, and evidently

intended to be worn. In the former

island, I also saw a skeleton of an old

man, I think, placed in a large bucket

in a sitting posture and hidden in the

buttress roots of a big tree. And by the

way, he likely stole the skeleton. In

one place there, close to the village,

was an immense heap of pig skulls, which

delighted our Andes, as the tusks had

not yet been taken from them, and my

people spent an afternoon in collecting

these. The great and he's referring to

as our Andes used Bor's tusks as spoke

shaves to smoothen their bow strings.

The Oni bow is rough and coarse, so I

guess they in the Sentinel don't apply

bore tusks to them. This mention of a

heap of Boris skulls is really

interesting because TK Pandit recounts

how he saw similar sites almost a

century later in the 1970s. And that's

all you're getting for today. Thank you

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