Deserta Grande Island

It is located 23 kilometres (14 mi) southeast of Madeira Island, off the western coast of North Africa in the Atlantic Ocean.

South of the base, no approach to the island closer than 100 m is permitted in order to protect the critically endangered Mediterranean monk seal breeding population.

The large, critically endangered wolf spider Hogna ingens is endemic to Deserta Grande.

The island has breeding Cory's shearwaters, Bulwer's petrels and Madeiran storm-petrels.

They had not been observed for over a century, and was assumed to have vanished from their natural habitat in a windswept.