Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations - 10th of August 2015

Case name: 2015_08_10-AEG35
Situation: Two vessels in distress in the Aegean Sea, near Bodrum, rescued by Turkey
Status of WTM Investigations: Concluded
Place of Incidents: Aegean Sea

Summary of the case: The Alarm Phone was contacted by Nawal Soufi’s activist collective shortly after midnight, on Monday the 10th of August 2015. They informed our shift team about an emergency situation in the Aegean Sea and passed on a mobile phone number as well as the GPS position of the vessel in distress which was located near Bodrum/Turkey. The passengers could not be directly contacted. We reached out to the Greek authorities who said that since the vessel was located in Turkish waters they could not conduct a rescue operation. When we reached out to the Turkish coastguard they informed us that they had already heard about the case and had sent three rescue vessels to the position of the distressed travellers. The situation became more dramatic with travellers stating that water was entering their vessel and that some of them did not wear life vests.

At about 1.12am, the activist collective forwarded the position and a mobile phone number of travellers on another vessel in distress, in close proximity to the first vessel. At about 2.04am, the Turkish coastguard stated that 4 groups on 4 different vessels had been rescued in the area, with nobody missing. A few minutes later we also received a confirmation from Nawal’s network that the passengers from the first vessel had been rescued.