The most isolated settlement in the world is located on an island formed from the Earth's depths. Discover its intriguing location!

Tristan da Cunha, often referred to simply as Tristan, is a group of islands located in the South Atlantic, formed from the breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana. It is also considered the most remote inhabited island on Earth, with its population comprising a tiny and highly isolated farming community, as reported by Live Science.

Only about 250 people reside on Tristan, holding British Overseas Territories citizenship, and their community is known as Edinburgh of the Seven Seas. Tristan da Cunha consists of six volcanic islands situated 2,400 kilometers southwest of Saint Helena — another British outpost in the Atlantic.

The main island of the group spans 12 kilometers in width, and its cone-shaped volcano, known as Queen Mary's Peak, rises 2,062 meters above sea level. The central crater of the volcano contains a heart-shaped lake that freezes in winter and melts in summer, providing a cool swimming spot for tourists who hike to the summit. The island is also a paradise for wildlife watchers: seals, albatrosses, and northern rockhopper penguins (Eudyptes moseleyi) nest along its shores. It’s worth noting that Tristan can only be reached by boat from South Africa, and the journey takes six days.

Researchers point out that the six islands of Tristan are evidence of past geological activity deep within the Earth's mantle, each formed from peaks in the oceanic crust. All the islands are located roughly 400 kilometers east of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, where the North American and South American plates meet the Eurasian and African plates.

Over time, these tectonic plates have gradually moved apart, allowing molten rock to bubble up in the gaps between them. Scientists have also discovered that the Tristan islands are not connected by a ridge; however, they were formed through the eruption of magma from the deeper layers of our planet.

Geologists found that the archipelago formed centuries ago from what is known as a hotspot — a large plume of hot material rising from deep within the mantle — creating volcanoes in the crust above it. As the continents split apart and the Earth's crust began shifting westward over the hotspot of the Walvis Ridge, volcanoes developed sequentially in a horizontal line beneath the opening Atlantic Ocean.

For thousands of years, they grew larger, forming islands. Eventually, the volcanoes became dormant as they drifted further away from their magma source, known as the "hotspot."

The main island of Tristan da Cunha is the second easternmost in the archipelago. In simple terms, it became extinct shortly after the four islands — Inaccessible, Nightingale, Middle, and Stoltenhoff — and just before the easternmost island, Gough.