Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 3rd of November 2015

Case name: 2015_11_03-AEG118
Situation: Alarm Phone active in 6 cases of distress near Lesvos, Didim, Agathonisi, Kastellerizo, Ro, and Nera‬‬
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Cases: On Tuesday the 3rd of November 2015, the Alarm Phone was alerted to 9 cases of distress in the Aegean Sea and became active in 6 cases of travellers in distress at sea and on land.

Around midnight we received a message on Facebook about travellers in distress near Mytilene/ Lesvos, because of high waves (Case 1). We reached out o the travellers, who told us that they were 60 persons on board and in need of help, as water was coming into the boat. We forwarded their position to the Turkish coastguard in Ankara. At ten to 1am, the travellers sent us an updated position, which showed them in Greek territorial waters. We could not reach them anymore and decided to also inform the Greek coastguard. The contact person who had first informed us about the case stayed in touch with the travellers and informed us at 7.30am that the travellers had arrived safely in Greece.

About one hour later, at 1am, we received another request via WhatsApp to call assistance for a group of 35 to 50 travellers in distress off the Turkish coast, near Didim (Case 2). We immediately informed the Turkish coastguard and they promised to send a boat. At 7.30 we called the Turkish coastguard again, but instead of providing us with information about the rescue operation they told us to send them an email. In the afternoon around 4pm we called the coastguard again and they told us that the rescue operation was ongoing. We agreed that we would call back two hours later. At 6pm the coastguard confirmed the rescue of the boat.

At 3.12am we received an alert via Facebook also concerning a boat in distress near Didim, this time involving about 70 travellers (Case 3). We called the Turkish coastguard, who was already informed about the case, as several relatives of travellers had called them as well. On Tuesday morning, we sent an email to the coastguard and we tried to reach out to the travellers to have their rescue confirmed. At 12am the travellers told us that they were safe and back in turkey.

Half an hour after the third alert had reached us, we received another Facebook alert about a group of 8 persons stranded on Kastellorizo (Case 4). The Greek coastguard was already informed about the case and the travellers seemed to have at least some food on them. In the morning we contacted the Greek coastguard to ask about an update. At 12.45pm our contact person on Facebook confirmed that the travellers had been rescued.

At 8:37am we received a WhatsApp message about another stranded group - this time it concerned 50 persons, who had stranded at 7am on the small Greek island of Ro, west of Kastellorizo (Case 5). We could not reach the group, but forwarded the information to the Greek coastguard, who promised to send help. We asked the contact person to tell the travellers that help was underway. At 5pm the contact person finally confirmed that the travellers had been rescued.

In the night from Tuesday to Wednesday, shortly before midnight, we were informed by a member of "Save the Refugees" about a group of 45 persons stranded on the island of Nera, Agathonisi (Case 6). We reached out to the travellers and a woman told us that they were 20 men, 15 women and 10 children and that they had no food or water left. We advised her to call 112 and told her that we would inform the Greek coastguard. We sent an email to the coastguard. In the morning from 7am onwards we tried to call the stranded travellers again, but without success. The Greek coastguard told us that they were not responsible for distress cases on land. We thus called the Hellenic coastguard. They did not give us any concrete information, but told us that they had picked several persons from Nera today. At 5.25pm after several attempts a staff member of the Hellenic coastguard finally confirmed to us that the 45 persons had been picked up in Nera and that they had been brought to Agathonisi.

Besides the 6 cases described above, the Alarm Phone was alerted to three other cases, but in which we did not become active either because help reached the travellers without our intervention or because they reached land by themselves. In one case we were informed about a group of 47 persons going towards Agathonisi. They were panicky, because of the high waves, but they were already very close to the island and eventually reached land by themselves. In another case, someone called us asking for help, but when we called him back a few minutes later with a translator, he said that he was safe. Finally we were alerted about a boat carrying 40 persons moving toward Lesvos, but received the confirmation of their rescue by the Greek coastguard a few minutes later.