Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 26th of October 2019
Case name: 2019_10_26-WM423
Situation: Two boats carrying 32 and 24 travellers rescued by Salvamento Maritimo and brought to the Canary Islands.
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the Case: On Saturday the 26th of October the Alarm Phone was alerted to two groups of travellers, one consisting of 32 travellers including 14 women and four children, and one of 24 people including three women and two children. Both boats had left from Dakhla and were heading towards the Canary Islands. In the end they were both rescued by the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo (SM) after very long time at sea, and brought to the Canary islands.

At 12.37pm CET the Alarm Phone was alerted by a relative to a boat carrying 32 people, including 14 women and four children. The boat had left from Dakhla the previous evening at 9.30pm local time heading for the Canary Islands, and the relative had lost contact to the travellers at around 1.30am local time. It had not been possible for the relative at that time to obtain a gps position of the boat. Our shift team tried many times throughout the following days to get in touch with the travellers, but without success.
At 8.48pm the same day we still had no further news about the boat, but decided to alert SM who informed us that they had ongoing operations in the area. Throughout the night and following day we made several calls to SM, but they could not give us any updates about any rescue operation concerning the boat. At 11.51am the next morning they informed us about two rescue operations that had been carried out, but the numbers of travellers didn’t correspond with the information we had received. We were later in the day in contact with the Guardia Civil several times in order to receive more information about whether the travellers we had been alerted to had been rescued, but for a long time this remained unclear. Only at 10.20am the next day (28th of October) did we get confirmation from the Guardia Civil that no rescue had been carried out of a boat with the number of travellers we had been informed about. We therefore called SM again to pass on the information that the boat we had alerted them to was still at sea. They confirmed that a search and rescue operation was ongoing. At 2.10pm we were finally informed by the relative that the travellers had arrived safely to Tenerife, and this was confirmed by SM at 4.26pm.

At 9.43pm another relative alerted us to a boat carrying 24 travellers, including three women and two children who had left from Dakhla at 1am. The relative had last had contact to the boat at 3.30am. We tried calling the travelers many times, but didn’t manage to reach them. At 11.59pm we called SM Tenerife and passed on the information we had. At 3.05am we called SM again, but they could not give us any update about ongoing rescue operations. Throughout the night and morning we kept calling the travellers but without success. At 11.51am we called SM Las Palmas and Gran Canaria, who told us that they had rescued two boats. A few minutes later the relative confirmed that the travellers had been rescued.