Bouvet Island 247 years after its discovery. The Norwegian Polar Institute established a research station, made of shipping containers, at Nyrøysa in 1996. On 23 February 2006, the island experienced a magnitude 6.2 earthquake whose epicentre was about away, weakening the station's foundation and causing it to be blown to sea during a winter storm. In 2014, a new research station was sent from Tromsø in Norway, via Cape Town, to Bouvet. The new station is designed to house six people for periods of two to four months. In the mid-1980s, Bouvetøya, Jan Mayen, and Svalbard were considered as locations for the
South Sentinel Island in the channel between this island and Little Andaman Island. Politically, South Sentinel Island is part of Little Andaman Taluk. The island is in effect a sovereign area under Indian protection. In 2018, Government of India excluded 29 islands – including the South Sentinel from the Restricted Area Permit (RAP) regime, till 31 December 2022 – in a major effort to boost tourism here. In November 2018, however, the government's Home ministry stated that the relaxation of the prohibition was intended only to allow researchers and anthropologists, with pre-approved clearance, to visit the Sentinel islands. The island is uninhabited but