Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 26th of September 2019

Case name: 2019_09_26-CM195
Situation: Approx. 40 people in distress in Italian waters close to Lampedusa, most probably rescued by Italian Coastguard and brought to Lampedusa.
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the Case:

On Thursday, 26th of September 2019 at 05:50am CEST the Alarm Phone shift team received a distress call from a group of travelers. According to the person we were talking to, there were 35 people, among them 8 children and 7 women, on a blue, wooden boat. The GPS location they communicated to us showed them in Italian territorial waters, close to Lampedusa. We agreed they would send a SMS with the coordinates to be sure we received them correctly. At 06:16am they called us back, telling us they were scared, the engine was broken, water was entering the boat. They could see land in the distance. We talked to a woman who gave us slightly different information about the number of children and women on board. At 06:35am we informed the Italian Coastguard in Rome. From then on, we could not get through to the travelers anymore. At 08:50am we called the Port Authorities of Lampedusa who confirmed the rescue of a group of 35 people and told us to call back later for more details. At 12:17pm they specified the rescued people had been in a blue wooden boat close to the coast, around 40 persons, among them women and children. We assumed this was our case, although we did not have a direct confirmation of their rescue from the travelers.