A Stunning Drone’s Eye View of the Uninhabited North Brother Island on New York City’s East River

Long Island FAA-certified drone photographer David Erat of DCE IT Services has captured an absolutely stunning overhead view of North Brother Island, an island that sits on the East River between The Bronx and Rikers Island and is uninhabited by humans. The island was once home Riverside Hospital, a quarantine center that housed victims of smallpox and typhoid, including the infamous Typhoid Mary. The island is now home to thousands of native birds.

The northern of the islands was uninhabited until 1885, when Riverside Hospital moved there from Blackwell’s Island (now known as Roosevelt Island). Riverside Hospital was founded in the 1850s as the Smallpox Hospital to treat and isolate victims of that disease. Its mission eventually expanded to other quarantinable diseases. …Mary Mallon, also known as Typhoid Mary, was confined to the island for over two decades until she died there in 1938. The hospital closed shortly thereafter.