Europa Island (French: Île Europå, pronounced [il øʁɔpa]) is nowhere near Europe. It is a small atoll off East Africa, about halfway between southern Madagascar and southern Mozambique.

Understand

Population	0 (2021)
Time zone	UTC+03:00
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Europa Island

A French possession since 1897, this tropical, flat island is a heavily wooded wildlife sanctuary. It is administered from Réunion as one of the Scattered Islands of the Indian Ocean, part of French Southern and Antarctic Lands. There are no permanent inhabitants, only a small military garrison that staffs a weather station. The island is also visited by independent scientists.

Landscape

Europa is 6 km (3.7 mi) across, with a maximum altitude of 6 m (20 ft) and 22.2 km (13.8 mi) of coastline. It is surrounded by coral beaches and a fringing reef and encloses a mangrove lagoon of around 9 km² (3.5 sq mi) and open to the sea on one side.

Flora and fauna

The island's vegetation consists of dry forest, scrub, Euphorbia, the mangrove swamp, and the remains of a sisal plantation. It is one of the world's largest nesting sites for green sea turtles. It is also home to goats introduced by settlers in the late 18th century.

The island has been identified as an Important Bird Area by BirdLife International because it supports a large and diverse population of breeding seabirds and other waterbirds. It is the only known breeding site outside Aldabra and Madagascar for Malagasy pond herons. Seabirds include the second largest colony in the western Indian Ocean of great frigatebirds (with up to 1100 pairs), Audubon's shearwaters (up to 100 pairs, probably of the subspecies Puffinus lherminieri bailloni previously considered endemic to the Mascarene Islands), dimorphic egrets and Caspian terns.

Europa is home to an endemic subspecies of white-tailed tropicbird (Phaethon lepturus europae), three kinds of landbird (including an endemic subspecies of the Malagasy white-eye) and its own species of hissing cockroach.

Climate

Europa Island's climate is affected by the Agulhas Current with water temperatures usually above 30 °C (86 °F) , south-east trade winds during the (austral) winter and occasional cyclones. The climate can be described as a semi-arid and tropical combination with wet summers and dry winters.

Get in

By plane

There is a 1,5000-m unpaved airstrip on the island.

By boat

There are no ports or harbours, but anchorage is possible offshore.

Fees and permits

The island is a nature reserve.

Get around

Map of Europa Island

Buy

There is no economic activity on Europa Island.

Sleep

There is no public accommodation on Europa Island.

Connect

There's no way this little rock was going to get the .eu TLD. It's nominally part of France's .fr domain.