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“Rare footage has surfaced showing a plane flying over this forbidden island. Such sightings are extremely uncommon, as even aerial surveillance is limited in order to respect the tribe’s isolation. The footage has sparked global curiosity and once again highlighted the mystery surrounding the Sentinelese people and their way of life.”
This was from the hugely popular news-based Instagram account Worldinlast24hrs. The first comment I saw wasn’t from any news junkie, but from Gold Coast’s Dean Morrison. “It’s pumping,” said Dingo. Jon Mel then chimed in: “Looks like a good left-hander.” The goofy-footer, stereotypically, ignored the right. Former pro and surf industry exec, Heath “Nutty” Walker wrote, “Ummmm I’m seeing a perfect left and right… dang let’s hope they surf.”
The trio, like any self-respecting surfers, weren’t so concerned with the fact that the island of North Sentinel is home to one of the last remaining un-contacted tribes in the world. No, like any news footage shot that has the ocean as background, we surfers first zoom in to see if there might be any good waves.
With this footage, the quick glimpse shown from the plane revealed a left and right peeling into a deep and wide reef pass. You only needed a second to work out that it looked like a quality setup. The small island is in the Nicobar and Andaman chain of islands that snakes north from the tip of Sumatra, running parallel to the Myanmar (Burma) coast. Any of the bigger Indian Ocean swells that hit the Mentawais and Nias also make it up the archipelago.
A Google Earth search shows the island’s coral reefs are punctured by at least seven major passes on its south and west coasts, one of which is visible in the footage. And we know there are waves elsewhere in the islands. Its best and most well-known wave is Kumari Point, the right-hand point located on the southern tip of Little Andaman Island. That wave featured in 1999’s Thicker Than Water with Chris Malloy, Aaron Lambert and Tamayo Perry surfing, and Jack Johnson on the camera.
This very amateur footage (after you skip through the dull 60-second intro) shows just how good that right-hand point is:
So far, so good for Sentinel. Another tick is the lack of surfers on the island. In fact, it remains (almost) untouched. The one negative, though, is that this might be the most heavily localized wave on the planet. The last person to visit the island was John Chau in 2018. The missionary was immediately killed by the locals with bows and arrows and buried on the beach. In fact, the North Sentinel Boardriders make the Pipe Posse look like weenies and the Bra Boys like school children.
Mind you, they’ve always had a bad rep. Marco Polo, the first recorded Western visitor, called it “The land of the Headhunters.” We assume he didn’t mean they were efficient recruitment consultants. More recently, in the 1980s, a fishing boat was shipwrecked on the reef, and the crew had five days of sustained arrow attacks before being rescued.
In what is the only story of surfers, photographer John Callahan recounted a conversation with the captain of a boat charter, whose clients, he said, surfed the pass shown in the footage in 1999. The captain was parked in the channel, unaware of Sentinel’s history, when he saw a canoe of locals approach with spears.
“But they did nothing, and appeared to be listening to the music being played from the boat. After three slow circles, they paddled in the direction of the beach, reached the sand, carried their canoe up past the treeline, and disappeared into the forest,” Callahan told Swellnet. For the record, the song being played was “La Femme ‘d’Argent” from Air’s Moon Safari album.
In 2006, two Indian fishermen strayed within arrow range of the coast and were killed. They clearly hadn’t got the French synth pop memo. We have less sympathy for Chau. Not only did he not take a surfboard, but he also travelled to the island illegally, knowing he was in breach of current Indian law and advice that exposure to foreign pathogens could kill the local tribespeople.
The 30,000-year-old tribe is one of the most isolated and untouched communities left in the world. It hasn’t even heard Jack Johnson sing or seen Kelly Slater surf. Let alone them doing it together. Fewer than 100 people have met the locals over the last century. Not many lived to tell the tale.
And yet, could it be worth dodging a few arrows or the odd poisoned spear for the chance to surf one of the last unridden islands in the world? Even from a few seconds of footage from 10,000 feet, surfers can tell the chance of finding world-class waves is incredibly high.
Maybe it’s time for the world’s least hospitable surf camp?
