Sandy Island and the history of ghost islands

Cartography

I came across the page for Sandy Island recently. It is a fascinating example of a cartographic error that lasted from the 19th century all the way until 2012. For over a hundred years, it appeared in nautical charts and gazetteers, yet it never actually existed. It only vanished when a research ship sailed directly through its coordinates and found nothing but deep ocean. There is something quietly hopeful about the fact that we can still be surprised by our own maps, even in the age of satellite imagery and Google Maps. It reminds us that our records are human documents, prone to the same persistence and mistakes as anything else we create. I wonder if anyone has links to other phantom islands or similar mapping glitches. It feels like a great rabbit hole for a rainy afternoon.

Source

The island that existed on maps for a century but didn't actually exist