John Allen Chau
John Allen Chau (December 18, 1991 – November 17, 2018) was an American evangelical Christian missionary who was killed by the Sentinelese, an uncontacted tribe, after illegally travelling to North Sentinel Island in an attempt to introduce the tribe to Christianity. Early life Chau was born on December 18, 1991, in Scottsboro, Alabama, the third and youngest child of Lynda Adams-Chau, an organizer for Chi Alpha, and Patrick Chau, a Chinese-American psychiatrist who left China during the Cultural Revolution. Chau grew up in Vancouver, Washington and attended Vancouver Christian high school. He loved camping, hiking and travelling, and excelled at various club, charity and other extracurricular activities. He admired numerous explorers and missionaries including David Livingstone and Bruce Olson. He attended Oral Roberts University in Oklahoma, where he managed the university soccer team, and graduated cum laude in 2014 with a Bachelor of Science in exercise science. Before 2018, Chau had participated in missionary trips to Mexico, South Africa and Iraqi Kurdistan. He first traveled to the Andaman Islands in 2015 and 2016 as part of his missionary trips, but did not visit North Sentinel Island at that time. Contact with Sentinelese and death In 2017, Chau participated in 'boot camp' missionary training by the Kansas City-based evangelical organization All Nations. According to a report by The New York Times, the training included navigating a mock native village populated by missionary staff members who pretended to be hostile natives, wielding fake spears. During that year, he reportedly expressed his interest in converting the Sentinelese. In October 2018, Chau traveled to and established his residence at Port Blair, capital of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, where he prepared an initial contact kit including picture cards for communication, gifts for Sentinelese people, medical equipment, and other necessities. In August 2018, the Indian Home Ministry had removed 29 inhabited islands in Andaman and Nicobar from the Restricted Area Permit (RAP) regime, in an attempt to promote tourism. However, visiting North Sentinel Island without government permission remained illegal under the Andaman and Nicobar Islands (Protection of Aboriginal Tribes) Regulation, 1956. In November, Chau embarked on a journey to North Sentinel Island, which he thought could be "Satan's last stronghold on Earth", with the aim of contacting and living among the Sentinelese. In preparation for the trip, he was vaccinated and quarantined, and also undertook medical and linguistic training. Chau paid two fishermen (US$335.47) to take him near the island. The fishermen were later arrested. Chau expressed a clear desire to convert the tribe and was aware of the legal and mortal risks he was taking by his efforts, writing in his diary, "Lord, is this island Satan's last stronghold, where none have heard or even had the chance to hear your name?", "The eternal lives of this tribe is at hand", and "I think it's worthwhile to declare Jesus to these people. Please do not be angry at them or at God if I get killed ... Don't retrieve my body." On November 15,