Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 12th of November 2015

Case name: 2015_11_12-AEG127
Situation: Alarm Phone alerted to 9 distress cases in the Aegean Sea
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Cases: On Thursday the 12th of November 2015, the Alarm Phone dealt with 9 emergency cases in the Aegean Sea.

The first call reached us at midnight when our shift team was informed that a vessel would soon leave to cross the sea from Turkey to Greece (case 1). Friends from a Syrian activist collective that we cooperate with agreed to take over this case as they could more easily communicate with the group. Hours later we were notified by them that the travellers had been rescued to Chios at approximately 9am.

Shortly afterwards, one of the Syrian activists informed us that they had direct contact with travellers on a vessel in distress (case 2). We were told that the vessel carrying 33 people, including 10 children, had collided with a rock. Water was entering the vessel and the engine had broken down. We informed the Turkish coastguards at 0:38am and passed on all the details of the case. They promised to search for the vessel. We saw at 7am that the travellers had received a WhatsApp message that we had sent and at 9.20am our activist friends confirmed that the travellers were safe.

At 2.05am we were informed about a vessel close to Samos Island/Greece carrying 48 people, including children (case 3). A few minutes afterwards we contacted the Greek coastguards and passed on the GPS position of the vessel. They confirmed that they had already received information about this case and were working on it. At 3.54am, a contact person of ours confirmed that the people had been rescued.

At 3.33am we received a message via WhatsApp, alerting us to a vessel very close to Chios Island/Greece (case 4). Our contact person told us that they had no paddles and the engine had stopped working. We shortly after informed the Greek coastguards. For many hours we were not able to find out more about the well-being of the travellers until the following afternoon when they confirmed that they had reached Chios Island.

At 4.05am the same contact person from case 4 told us about another vessel in distress, still in Turkish waters (case 5). He asked us to alert the Turkish coastguards since the vessel’s engine had broken down and they could not move any further. We contacted the coastguards at 4.18am. They promised to search for the vessel. For some time we were not able to receive further information about the people but we saw that they received a WhatsApp message that we had sent at 5.52am. A few hours later, our initial contact person confirmed that they had been rescued and were safe.

At 4.18am the contact person of cases 4 and 5 told us about a group that had stranded on Kastellorizo Island/Greece and was unable to move on (case 6). There were about 20 people, including 5 children. We contacted the police in Kastellorizo at 4.43am and they confirmed that they would send a vessel to their position in the morning. We informed that contact person and asked him to advise the group to stay close together and wait for rescue. At 9.40am we were able to reach one of the members of the group. He informed us that he had walked to a village and had informed the police himself. At 11am they informed us that they had been found and were safe.

At 11.20am one of our Syrian activist friends informed us about 150 people who had stranded on Kalymnos Island/Greece after crossing the sea on three different vessels (case 7). Many of them had been on the island for a significant amount of time, between 4 and 12 hours. We contacted the Port Authority of Kalymnos who already knew about the case and had sent out the police.

At 5.40pm we were informed about a group of 40 people in distress near Lesvos Island/Greece (case 8). We could not reach them directly but at approximately 7am we were told that they had been rescued.

At 10.20pm we received a distress case through Viber (case 9). A vessel carrying 45 people was in distress near Chios Island/Greece. We contacted them and they informed us that they were still moving but that the weather conditions were difficult. Our initial contact person informed us at approximately 11am that they had reached the island safely.