Nightingale Island

Nightingale Island

Nightingale has two peaks on its north end. One is 337 metres (1,106 ft) high[1] while the other is 293 metres (961 ft) high. The rest of the island is ringed by cliffs. However, these cliffs are not nearly as high as those surrounding Nightingale's neighbour Inaccessible Island, which is approximately 16 km away and has cliffs approximately 300m high. Thus human access is much easier on Nightingale than on Inaccessible. The island is a volcano, composed of early and late stage ash deposits. Massive trachytic lava flows have been extruded in the past. Before 2004, the last eruption may have been over 39,000 years ago.

The two nearby islets are called Stoltenhoff (99 metres (325 ft)) and Middle (46 metres (151 ft)).

Large amounts of kelp surround the island, which makes it difficult to anchor ships in bad weather.

Nightingale Island has an oceanic climate similar to the other Tristan da Cunha islands.

Nightingale was possibly sighted along with Tristan da Cunha in 1506 by Tristão da Cunha, though he made no record of it.

It was originally named "Gebrooken Eyland" (Broken island) by the Dutch ship the Nachtglas under Jan Jacobszoon in January 1656, who found no safe anchorage; the first landing was not made until 1696 (most likely by Willem de Vlamingh in August of that year). French captain Pierre d'Etcheverry also visited the island in September 1767, first recording the two nearby islets now named Stoltenhoff and Middle.[2] The island was later renamed after British captain Gamaliel Nightingale, who explored the island in 1760.[3]

In the 17th and 18th centuries, the Dutch and French governments as well as the British East India Company considered taking possession of Nightingale (as well as Tristan and Inaccessible), but decided against it due to lack of landing space.

Nightingale has been said to contain pirate loot. Captain John Thomas, on an expedition to the South Atlantic, supposedly left a fortune of Spanish doubloons and pieces-of-eight in caves on Nightingale for safekeeping. However, no recovery of this treasure (if it is there) has ever been confirmed.

In 1811, the American pirate Jonathan Lambert laid claim to Tristan and its neighbouring islands. He wanted to call Inaccessible 'Pinsard Island', and Nightingale 'Lavel Island'. He was successful in his claim, but he died less than one year later.

In 1961, the 2,060-metre (6,760 ft) high shield volcano on Tristan da Cunha erupted and forced the inhabitants of Tristan da Cunha to evacuate to Nightingale. They eventually moved to the United Kingdom, returning to Tristan in 1963.

Wildlife conservation efforts are ongoing on Nightingale. The previous conservation workers' sheds were severely damaged during a storm produced by an extratropical cyclone in 2001 that reportedly included winds up to 120 mph.[4] Repair is ongoing, but to continue carrying out the conservation work, all of the damaged shacks on the island need to be repaired. The United Kingdom established funding for a conservation effort on Nightingale for 2004–06.

Albatrosses nesting in fernbrush on Nightingale Island

Nightingale Island is known as a breeding ground for various types of seabirds; over a million birds are estimated to breed on the island, with great shearwaters being among the most abundant. There are four wetland areas on the island which each contain hundreds of Atlantic yellow-nosed albatrosses. As with Inaccessible Island, Nightingale also has a breeding colony of northern rockhopper penguins, now an endangered species, with a fraction of the 1950s population remaining. The island is part of the Nightingale Islands group Important Bird Area (IBA), identified as such by BirdLife International as a breeding site for seabirds and endemic landbirds.[13]

Inaccessible and Gough Islands are strict nature reserves with no tourism permitted. However, tourists are permitted to go to Nightingale.

Many tourists to Tristan da Cunha visit Nightingale Island for the wildlife. Non-Tristanians can travel to Nightingale only with a guide from Tristan. Part of the money they pay the guide goes toward paying for the conservation work being done on the island. Once a year, filmmakers and journalists are permitted to work on the island (for a fee), but they are not allowed to interfere with the private lives of the Tristanian islanders. Also, Tristan natives visit Nightingale on holiday.

Fishing companies fish off the coast of Nightingale, just as they do with Inaccessible.

Nightingale also has guano deposits.

Several silver and cupro-nickel collector coins from Nightingale Island were issued in denominations of one crown in 2005 and 2006. A complete series of coins in values from ½ penny to £2 and including a one crown coin were issued in 2011 by Tristan da Cunha on behalf of Nightingale Island.

• Subantarctic fur seal – cupro-nickel – 1 crown denomination
• Mahi-mahi – bi-metallic – 25 pence
• Oarfish – brass – 20 pence
• Blue shark – cupro-nickel – 10 pence
• Octopus – cupro-nickel – 5 pence
• Bluefin tuna – copper – 2 pence
• Swordfish – copper – 1 penny
• Flyingfish – copper – ½ penny

Edgar Allan Poe's The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket alluded to Nightingale Island, Inaccessible Island, and Tristan da Cunha.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Nightingale Island.

• The Annals of Tristan da Cunha – gives comprehensive history of Tristan da Cunha, Inaccessible, and Nightingale from their initial discovery to 1925 (PDF file)
• Tristan da Cunha News: A conservation project on Nightingale Island
• The Loneliest Place in the World
• Etext of Chapter 15 of Narrative of A. Gordon Pym by Edgar Allan Poe – the chapter that contains the references to Tristan, Inaccessible, and Nightingale
• Tristan da Cunha website – includes information about visiting Nightingale
• Picture of the centre of Nightingale Island
• Nightingale Island Oil Spill – YouTube (1:53)
• Lindblad Expeditions (May 23, 2012). "Seldom-Visited Nightingale and Inaccessible Islands" (Video). National Geographic. Archived from the original on 2021-12-12 – via YouTube.

37°25′10″S 12°28′40″W