The disputed existence of the Aurora Islands, a remote territory claimed by Argentina

It's the year 2025. Artificial satellites have been taking images of the Earth, down to the last detail, for decades.

Sandy: the enigma of a ghost island that appeared on the maps of the Pacific Ocean
Point Nemo: the most inaccessible place and its relationship with space and strange sounds

It seems incredible that there could still be doubts about the existence of islands today, but that is actually what is happening today. Three years ago we saw the enigma of Sandy Island here, a non-existent territory that appeared on Google Maps and Google Earth until 2012. In other cases of phantom islands, they can be explained by natural phenomena that have caused them to disappear. But so far I have only seen one case of islands that were classified as a myth despite actually existing.

These are the Aurora Islands, an archipelago located in the South Atlantic, halfway between the Falkland Islands and South Georgia Islands, both held by the United Kingdom and claimed by Argentina. A Wikipedia entry describes the Aurora Islands as a "myth", stating that they may have been identified in the 16th century by Amerigo Vespucci and reported in 1762 by the Spanish ship Aurora. Wikipedia adds: "The islands were last recorded in 1856, but continued to appear on maps of the South Atlantic until 1870."

The paradox is that Wikipedia also has another entry that talks about the Aurora Islands, locating them in the same area and also attributing their discovery in 1762 to the Spanish ship "Aurora". This entry indicates that these islands are under British rule, although they are claimed by Argentina, and that in English they are known as "Shag Rocks". The entry includes three photos of the islands and two maps of their location, one of them approved by the United Nations under the 1995 Convention on the Law of the Sea.

To add more confusion to this matter, both Google Maps as Google Earth indicates the position of this archipelago, but its satellite images only show the sea. Google Earth includes a window with one of the rocky islets that appear in the aforementioned Wikipedia entry. So, do these islands exist or not? The answer is yes, although the matter has its peculiarities.

A few hours ago, the Argentine YouTube channel Un Mundo Inmenso published a complete video about these islands and analyzing the information that classifies them as a myth, and also pointing out the importance of this remote territory despite being made up of small, almost inaccessible rocky islets (the video is in Spanish, you can activate the automatic English subtitles in the bottom bar of the player):

---

Main photo: Andrew Shiva / Wikipedia / CC BY-SA 4.0.