Null Island : The Busiest Place that Doesn't Exist

Imagine relaxing on a tropical island, with golden sandy shores and turquoise waters, the warm Atlantic breeze caressing your face as you carelessly sip cool cocktails in a beachside tiki bar… what you are picturing is definitely NOT Null Island.

Null Island has no tiki bars, no sand, no turquoise waters and certainly no cocktails…yet in spite of this, it may be the most visited island in the whole world. Not bad for a figment of collective imaginations and an island that only exists on maps!

Where is this non-existent place? The point on the map where the Prime Meridian meets the Equator, at 0°N  0°E.  The Prime Meridian is the name for 0° longitude. Picture a circle around the globe which establishes the International Date Line, separating east and west hemispheres.

The better-known invisible line is the Equator, 0° latitude, which circumnavigates Earth, separating the northern and southern hemispheres. These lines help to standardise everything from dates, times and distances, and are used to plot exact locations worldwide.

Why do we need an imaginary island adrift in the vast Atlantic Ocean? It exists for geocoding reasons. Geocoding is the function performed by GIS – the Geographical Information System, that uses coordinates to covert and locate physical addresses and map them accordingly.

Null in computing terms means the data does not exist. When GPS systems fail, when codes are inputted incorrectly or typos occur, the data is tagged at 0°N 0°E or Null Island. Thus, the imaginary location is ‘visited’ multiple times a day by misfit codes from all over the world.

Is there nothing where Null Island should be? That is not strictly true. Bobbing away in the deep waters off fictitious Null Island is a permanently moored weather station known as Soul Buoy. It collects information to help scientists understand the tropical Atlantic climate.

Null Island has become somewhat of an internet legend as GPS and geotagging enthusiasts regularly send data there. There are pages dedicated to the hypothetical atoll, maps drawn of what it might look like, and fans have designed a national flag for the concocted archipelago!

Null Island is among the most visited places in the world, if geotagging counts. Since the term was coined in 2011, the Republic of Null Island is a geographical inside joke. Its not the only mythical dumping ground for invalid data, this map provides over 5,000 Nill Points.

Next time Google Maps glitches, delays your food delivery or sends you temporarily down the wrong path, thank your luck you and your dinner didn’t end up in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. Null Island is home to rogue data only and is not recommended for real life travellers!