One thing I often ask myself in these situations:
What do the inhabitants on these islands actually do?
There are 259 of them in this case.
Are they self-sustaining? How do they pay for stuff the want to import? Do they live off the cruise ships they supply? And do people generally stay there or do young people generally move to mainland?
Edit: For economy, it looks like they live off exporting langustas.
The UK built a crayfish processing facility so that they could have income. They also sell stamps and a few handmade crafts such as knitted socks. There are a few government jobs and they must make some money from tourism. And they all grow potatoes for their own consumption.
There's actually Street View images, so you can take a look, also at the agricultural plots southwest of the town (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potato_Patches ). There's some sheep, cattle and (I think) donkeys as well.
This recent article[1] answers a lot of these questions with great photos too. I would go so far to say it’s the most authoritative piece to date. Previously [2].
>Are they self-sustaining? How do they pay for stuff the want to import
Generally the modern day population of these types of islands are simply cover for the government to maintain political control of an area of ocean surrounding them. Same deal with the Falklands, Orkney/Shetland, etc. To that end their entire existence is more or less subsidised because of this.
Orkney is only 20 miles from the UK mainland so I'm not sure that's the reason. People there make fudge which is pretty good. Until recently (1956) it hosted a major Royal Navy base.
Those two aren't quite comparable; Orkney's been inhabited since before ancient Egypt. Tristan's much more recent, from when we needed stopping points everywhere for sailing ships to pick up water etc.
Isn’t the hosting of a naval base a good example of this island being subsidized because the government wants to control the waters around it? And it being close to mainland is another reason, you don’t want another country having an island that close to you.
I think this is one of the few things as late that makes me feel genuinely proud to be British, because, beneath the hostility that feels so rife across our country recently, we’ve so many good people making things like this happen. Bravo.
As the persons said, they are not observing it in real life.
This is what I also have observed in various contexts as well. Social media is not a representation of what real people think. Most people in real life does not comment in social media, or they comment on inconsequential or trivial things....
Social media gets distorted by a handful of extremists who are motivated, and by commercial interests. A lot of the nastiest stuff is not even posted by British people, but people masquerading as British: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckgpyn30dp3o
I know exactly what you mean. But for me there's an even greater emotion here... relief. At a time when everything feels so utterly divided, it's such a relief to see a positive story that everyone can celebrate and feel proud of, regardless of their stance. Better, it's a story that can't be politicised one way or the other, it has a purity about it. I think if we had more positive stories like this, our political & ideological differences wouldn't seem so all consuming.
It certainly involved a lot of skill and expense, but how many more lives could be saved if the same money had been spent on improved traffic safety or NHS in general?
Wow, logistics to <remote place> are very expensive! We could spend that money better in the cities!
Wow, logistics in <city> is expensive! We could spend that money better in rural areas!
I read about a new road tunnel in London last year, a ten-digit price tag for about 1km of road IIRC. I'm 100% sure some people suggested that that money could have been better spent in rural areas.
The one thing you seem to be missing in your anticolonialist tirades is the fact that Tristan was uninhabited. It’s not like native peoples were displaced by the British colonists, right?
Many self-described anticolonialists forget that "self-determination" doesn't actually mean "people who live far away from the mainland should just fuck off and take care of themselves".
I've experienced it a bit as a Frenchman (and we have quite a few remote territories as well) who has lived on a couple of remote places (that were uninhabited as well before becoming French, but that shouldn't actually matter) and it's incredible how puny, short-sighted and simply egoistical some people can be.
I'm saying that it is common for some people to advocate for jettisoning other parts of their country, especially if they are far away from where they live.
No, you're correct Britain is a collection of islands in the northern hemisphere. This however is an island in the Atlantic ocean and is a British Overseas Territory.
It's a small price to pay to keep political control. Probably not the entire motivation here, but generally countries like keeping their remote islands and settlements lived in because it represents a claim of the land by proxy.
People respond to inspiring stories that show what is possible. Inevitably that means choices that might not match what a perfect allocation looks like.
Quiet, bland execution in government will get you voted out. Technocrats tend to come in after corruption, but they don’t usually last.
There's been repeated efforts to depopulate the Island by the UK government because it's expensive when you have to do drops like this - the people living there want to be there and prior to them getting there it was an uninhabited island.
I'm not really sure it meets the definition of a colony in the modern sense of the word.
I think this was also a “look what we can do at short notice” kind of exercise. Just in case a country was thinking of maybe trying to take over another set of islands in the south Atlantic
I'm no expert but that looks like an impressive feat of skill, coming blind through the clouds and picking out a relatively small patch to land on. Remember also it is late autumn there, pretty windy (according to TFA) and the wind would probably be doing weird things off the sea around those cliffs. All in all, very cool.
Sweet ... I saw the original video just the other day. The fact that they just dropped in from 7K feet, then proceeded to do medical stuff is the very definition of "bad ass".
Agreed. The story is great, too. A really interesting logistical challenge that arose from unusual circumstances.
There's probably something to be said for the fact that TDC is a small, remote community, so it shouldn't be surprising that its website is reminiscent of a smaller, more communal web... but I'm not going to try to read too much into it and let the story stand on its own.
Until recently TDC had a very slow FCDO satellite link that required their website to be quite basic in order to actually be viewable on computers on the island.
They now have a fast Starlink connection, but I’m glad they’ve kept the website as it is.
On windswept shores where oceans foam,
Far from the bustle and noise of home,
The island watched the grey skies part,
With hope returning to every heart.
Across the vastness the RAF flew through,
With medicine, medics, and military too,
Parachuting in with skill and courage on our shore,
The impossible was accomplished to the core.
Tristan da Cunha, proud and small,
A community who always stand together through it all,
Neighbours helping each other, such an amazing sight,
Hoping everything done before the loss of daylight.
It is not 'very nice'; it's often generic and lacking in any insight or striking imagery, the meter is ragged and inconsistent while the rhymes are often padding or outright slant (through/too, shore/core?). But I will grant it this: despite the AABB quatrain meter making it look exactly like AI slop, the flaws and errors show that it's probably genuinely amateur-written (as does a '100% human' rating in Pangram).
Were the ICU nurse and Doctor trained for the tandem jump previously - I've not seen that said in any of the stories published. Or did they just find a random ICU nurse and Doctor who was up for it?
It does not take anything more than listening to instructions and remaining calm to do a tandem parachute. Doctors and nurses on average have those skills. And those who volunteer for a mission like this undoubtedly do.
Polar stations are even more inaccessible during polar winter with months of total darkness and it is just too dangerous to reach them. The winter-over crews need to be completely self-sufficient until the sun rises again.
For the big McMurdo US base they have flown in a few times in the winter for extremely important life or death medical reasons (last year: Aug 25 [1]) For the smaller other country bases it tends to be too dangerous and impossible. They are not able to use mcmurdo and the americans cant help either.
The general rule is that the Americans don't fly during the winter but they do tend to downplay and not publicize the times when they do fly.
From what I gathered from the article the person who got off was a resident of Tristan? They have such limited shipping options that this might have been the only way for them to travel from any mainland. Not sure though, but I don't think they got off there to seek medical assistance.
Very nice story.
One thing I often ask myself in these situations: What do the inhabitants on these islands actually do?
There are 259 of them in this case.
Are they self-sustaining? How do they pay for stuff the want to import? Do they live off the cruise ships they supply? And do people generally stay there or do young people generally move to mainland?
Edit: For economy, it looks like they live off exporting langustas.
The UK built a crayfish processing facility so that they could have income. They also sell stamps and a few handmade crafts such as knitted socks. There are a few government jobs and they must make some money from tourism. And they all grow potatoes for their own consumption.
Lobsters. https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20250915-tristan-da-cunha...
There's actually Street View images, so you can take a look, also at the agricultural plots southwest of the town (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potato_Patches ). There's some sheep, cattle and (I think) donkeys as well.
This recent article[1] answers a lot of these questions with great photos too. I would go so far to say it’s the most authoritative piece to date. Previously [2].
[1] https://apps.npr.org/life-on-tristan-da-cunha/
[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47640431
There was an AMA by a journalist on the island this year: https://www.reddit.com/r/howislivingthere/comments/1q06v24/i...
>Are they self-sustaining? How do they pay for stuff the want to import
Generally the modern day population of these types of islands are simply cover for the government to maintain political control of an area of ocean surrounding them. Same deal with the Falklands, Orkney/Shetland, etc. To that end their entire existence is more or less subsidised because of this.
Looking at Orkney and the Shetlands on a map, the UK is the logical country for them to belong to, unless Scotland becomes independent.
By the way, Skara Brae is worth seeing if you are at all interested in history. I'd rate it at least on the same level as Stonehenge.
Looking at the position of the Falklands on a map however ... different story.
Orkney is only 20 miles from the UK mainland so I'm not sure that's the reason. People there make fudge which is pretty good. Until recently (1956) it hosted a major Royal Navy base.
Those two aren't quite comparable; Orkney's been inhabited since before ancient Egypt. Tristan's much more recent, from when we needed stopping points everywhere for sailing ships to pick up water etc.
Isn’t the hosting of a naval base a good example of this island being subsidized because the government wants to control the waters around it? And it being close to mainland is another reason, you don’t want another country having an island that close to you.
No, the island is already within the territorial waters, it doesn't noticeably expand it.
Uh, doesn't it extend it the entire size of Orkney plus another 12 nm?
I think this is one of the few things as late that makes me feel genuinely proud to be British, because, beneath the hostility that feels so rife across our country recently, we’ve so many good people making things like this happen. Bravo.
The hostility is rife across social media. I don't see much of it day to day.
Reminds me of the Bill Hicks bit during the early days of CNN and 24-hour news channels: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGjuPJskNRE
Unfortunately, for a few years now, social media is real life...
As the persons said, they are not observing it in real life.
This is what I also have observed in various contexts as well. Social media is not a representation of what real people think. Most people in real life does not comment in social media, or they comment on inconsequential or trivial things....
Social media gets distorted by a handful of extremists who are motivated, and by commercial interests. A lot of the nastiest stuff is not even posted by British people, but people masquerading as British: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckgpyn30dp3o
I know exactly what you mean. But for me there's an even greater emotion here... relief. At a time when everything feels so utterly divided, it's such a relief to see a positive story that everyone can celebrate and feel proud of, regardless of their stance. Better, it's a story that can't be politicised one way or the other, it has a purity about it. I think if we had more positive stories like this, our political & ideological differences wouldn't seem so all consuming.
It certainly involved a lot of skill and expense, but how many more lives could be saved if the same money had been spent on improved traffic safety or NHS in general?
Probably not that many. You underestimate how expensive either of those things are.
We have obligations to provide services like this to the people living in our overseas territories, and you won’t find many people who’ll oppose that.
This is a classic. It occurs in two forms:
Wow, logistics to <remote place> are very expensive! We could spend that money better in the cities!
Wow, logistics in <city> is expensive! We could spend that money better in rural areas!
I read about a new road tunnel in London last year, a ten-digit price tag for about 1km of road IIRC. I'm 100% sure some people suggested that that money could have been better spent in rural areas.
We shouldn't be wasting a penny on colonies, this isn't the age of Napoleon anymore, get the English out of any country that isn't England.
You're suggesting that we should run a h3 grid over the world and assign everybody territory based on their haploytype?
Or is it only the 'English' who should be confined to certain geogrpahical parameters?
I'm English and live in another nation. I'm guessing me and my family should go 'home'?
The one thing you seem to be missing in your anticolonialist tirades is the fact that Tristan was uninhabited. It’s not like native peoples were displaced by the British colonists, right?
Many self-described anticolonialists forget that "self-determination" doesn't actually mean "people who live far away from the mainland should just fuck off and take care of themselves".
I've experienced it a bit as a Frenchman (and we have quite a few remote territories as well) who has lived on a couple of remote places (that were uninhabited as well before becoming French, but that shouldn't actually matter) and it's incredible how puny, short-sighted and simply egoistical some people can be.
The Netherlands has a few islands off the coast of Venezuela.
Very few of the people who live there want full independence lol.
I'm missing your point here
I'm saying that it is common for some people to advocate for jettisoning other parts of their country, especially if they are far away from where they live.
I did assume, and it makes a change, but Britain isn't in the middle of the Atlantic ocean.
No, you're correct Britain is a collection of islands in the northern hemisphere. This however is an island in the Atlantic ocean and is a British Overseas Territory.
> This however is an island in the Atlantic ocean and is a British Overseas Territory.
Britain is actually 3 countries under the control, largely, of England. Britain is the name they use for their empire loot.
They can call it what they like, if they dont mind giving up say, the south coast of Britain? No, then pot kettle my man.
What definition of empire are you running here? Is it the same definition you'd assign to Russia, India, China, Ethiopia, Iran, Myanmar?
Are the Andaman Islands, Kaliningrad, Midway, Ogaden, Balochistan, Xinjiang all loot under the auspices of empire?
What about the Galapagos? Svalbard? Falklands? All loot? Looted from who?
The word's thrown around a lot, it'd be nice to have a definition for once.
This guys comment history is absolutely wild! So utterly full of hate and ignorance. Amazing how often those two things go hand in hand.
I get mad upvotes so what does that tell you
Karma 98 after 8 months. What does that tell you?
Youve been riled by my carefree attitude
It's a small price to pay to keep political control. Probably not the entire motivation here, but generally countries like keeping their remote islands and settlements lived in because it represents a claim of the land by proxy.
People respond to inspiring stories that show what is possible. Inevitably that means choices that might not match what a perfect allocation looks like.
Quiet, bland execution in government will get you voted out. Technocrats tend to come in after corruption, but they don’t usually last.
You'd rather we ignored our overseas compatriots?
Colonists you mean.
There's been repeated efforts to depopulate the Island by the UK government because it's expensive when you have to do drops like this - the people living there want to be there and prior to them getting there it was an uninhabited island.
I'm not really sure it meets the definition of a colony in the modern sense of the word.
Just to let you know: Colony: "a geographical area politically controlled by a distant country"
If it's verboten, then I'm guessing:
All Arabs back to the Arabian peninsula? "Latin Americans" back to Europe? The removal of 98% of the USA, Australia, etc? Malagasy back to Madagascar?
Sounds very genocidal... At least half of the world's population uprooted at least :/
And the English back to various corners of north west Europe and the Scots back to Scythia!
True, but this is military expenditure. So would you rather they spend this on an exercise or on actually saving people?
Yeah and helps demonstrate thst Tristan is strategically important
I think it's rich the English dont like foreigners given how many countries they think they're entitled to posses
Not sure what that means. What do you think the Uk claims to own?
Lots of european countries owned colonies until the post-war settlement.
And immigration to UK is at an all time high so not sure on other point?
Immigration to the UK is not at an all time high - both immigration and net migration are down pretty sharply:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c70989jrdweo
The general trend of the past years has increased immigration
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/migration-advisor...
Its not an open border and the rules changed and now it is decreasing
I think this was also a “look what we can do at short notice” kind of exercise. Just in case a country was thinking of maybe trying to take over another set of islands in the south Atlantic
Capabilities need to be practiced in order to be dependable.
I'm no expert but that looks like an impressive feat of skill, coming blind through the clouds and picking out a relatively small patch to land on. Remember also it is late autumn there, pretty windy (according to TFA) and the wind would probably be doing weird things off the sea around those cliffs. All in all, very cool.
That jump video is wild. Can't see the island until the last few minutes.
Sweet ... I saw the original video just the other day. The fact that they just dropped in from 7K feet, then proceeded to do medical stuff is the very definition of "bad ass".
Amazing! Tristan’s entire website is a treasure. It’s a throwback to when the web was great.
They have a slow connection. That's a constraint that will keep you efficient.
Agreed. The story is great, too. A really interesting logistical challenge that arose from unusual circumstances.
There's probably something to be said for the fact that TDC is a small, remote community, so it shouldn't be surprising that its website is reminiscent of a smaller, more communal web... but I'm not going to try to read too much into it and let the story stand on its own.
Until recently TDC had a very slow FCDO satellite link that required their website to be quite basic in order to actually be viewable on computers on the island.
They now have a fast Starlink connection, but I’m glad they’ve kept the website as it is.
If they hosted locally, it shouldn't have been an issue, they could have had a mirror system, but that's by the by, I love the website
Very nice poem from a local:
It is not 'very nice'; it's often generic and lacking in any insight or striking imagery, the meter is ragged and inconsistent while the rhymes are often padding or outright slant (through/too, shore/core?). But I will grant it this: despite the AABB quatrain meter making it look exactly like AI slop, the flaws and errors show that it's probably genuinely amateur-written (as does a '100% human' rating in Pangram).
Tremendous stuff. Made better by the throwback web styling. Almost broke out in to the national anthem halfway through the article.
The helmet cam video gave me a sense of just how difficult such operations are. I'm grateful we have people who will accept such assignments.
What a heartwarming article.
Were the ICU nurse and Doctor trained for the tandem jump previously - I've not seen that said in any of the stories published. Or did they just find a random ICU nurse and Doctor who was up for it?
144 Parachute Medical Squadron has a number of specialists available - https://www.army.mod.uk/learn-and-explore/about-the-army/cor...
It does not take anything more than listening to instructions and remaining calm to do a tandem parachute. Doctors and nurses on average have those skills. And those who volunteer for a mission like this undoubtedly do.
Article in the Guardian suggested the medic had been in a tandem jump before bu the doctor hadn't (or it might be the other way around)
The only reason military should exist is to perform such life-saving, not life-ending, missions...
What if you were Ukrainian?
Seems consistent. Ukrainian soldiers are performing life saving missions i.e. defending their citizens from an unprovoked attack.
then the military would also act life-saving, since they are defending the attacked country
Then the military should have stopped the country from trying to join NATO, avoiding the invasion of Russia and saving countless lives and homes.
In case you're as interested as I was, they have google street view.
Visiting Tristan Da Cunha is on my bucket list. Just a shame it takes so long to get there, but maybe that's part of the appeal.
> The plane flew between Inaccessible and Tristan
My god there actually is an island called Inaccessible Island! That's fantastic.
In that case, you will probably also be happy to learn about:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unnecessary_Mountain
We have a mountain here called Bod an Deamhain meaning the Demon's D*ck. It has been anglicised into something more polite.
If you want something more bleak, there are also islands called Disappointment and Desolation.
This is the best thing, thank you.
I'm sure you'll be happy to learn that access to Inaccessible Island must be granted by the local government office.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inaccessible_Island
Definitely on the short list of locations to build my Bond villain lair.
Literally one of the worst places to fall seriously ill due to the fact you are absolutely and totally stuck in the actual middle-of-nowhere.
Polar stations are even more inaccessible during polar winter with months of total darkness and it is just too dangerous to reach them. The winter-over crews need to be completely self-sufficient until the sun rises again.
For the big McMurdo US base they have flown in a few times in the winter for extremely important life or death medical reasons (last year: Aug 25 [1]) For the smaller other country bases it tends to be too dangerous and impossible. They are not able to use mcmurdo and the americans cant help either.
The general rule is that the Americans don't fly during the winter but they do tend to downplay and not publicize the times when they do fly.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/aug/06/mcmurdo-statio...
Free (but admittedly useless) advice when you plan to fall seriously ill:
- do not get on a cruise ship
- do not get off at a remote island
From what I gathered from the article the person who got off was a resident of Tristan? They have such limited shipping options that this might have been the only way for them to travel from any mainland. Not sure though, but I don't think they got off there to seek medical assistance.
Wonderful. I love the poem at the end too.