Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 7th of December 2015

Case name: 2015_12_07-AEG150
Situation: 5 boats in distress near the Greek islands of Samos, Lesvos and Chios, one group stranded on the island of Ro
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Cases: On Monday the 7th of December 2015 the Alarm Phone was alerted to 5 boats in distress in the Aegean Sea and to one group of travellers who had stranded on the Greek island of Ro. While in three cases rescue cannot finally be confirmed, in three cases the travellers on board of the boats in distress had been rescued by the Greek coastguard.

At 3.45am the Alarm Phone received a WhatsApp message from a contact person informing us about a boat in distress close to the Turkish town of Kuşadası and north east of the Greek island of Samos, with 25 men, 10 women and 9 children on board (case 1). Their boat’s engine had stopped several times and water was entering the boat. The contact person had already alerted the Turkish coastguard. 30 minutes later he forwarded updated coordinates to us and we called the Turkish coastguard again. We were told that a rescue mission is already on its way. Again 30 minutes later, at 4.45am we learned the people on board could see a Turkish coastguard vessel approaching them. However, at 5.40am we again received updated coordinates from 5.20am and were informed that they had not yet been rescued. But as the contact to the boat was lost at 5.20am, neither the contact person nor we were able to figure out what was happening. However, the boat was still constantly moving towards the Greek island of Samos and had almost reached Greek territorial waters. In the following hours we were not able to reach the travellers again.

At 4.08am the same contact person alerted us to a group of 35 travellers who had stranded on the Greek island of Ro and had already called the emergency hotline 112 (case 2). 30 minutes later we sent an e-mail to the Greek Joint Rescue Coordination Centre and the contact person called the coastguard on the neighbouring island of Kastellorizo. She was told to call back 3 hours later. At 6.40am the travellers called us directly and informed us about their miserable situation. The night was very cold and especially the 12 children of the group were freezing, with their cloths wet from leaving the boat while landing on the island. We informed them that we had already alerted the coastguard, but that they will only pick them up from the island at about 8am. At 7am the contact person called the coastguard again and was told to wait another 3 hours. We agreed to call the coastguard back at 10am. Afterwards contact to the group could not be established again. However, we assume that the group had been transferred to the next bigger island soon.

At 9.15am another contact forwarded the GPS position and phone number of a group in distress close to the Greek island of Samos to us (case 3). We called the Greek coastguard immediately afterwards, but in the same moment the contact person informed us that the group had already been rescued.

30 minutes later, at 9.38am, the Alarm Phone was called by a contact person who was in contact to a group of 40 people whose engine had stopped on their way to the Greek island of Lesvos (case 4). At 9.40am we alerted the Greek coastguard to this boat and they confirmed to send a rescue vessel to this boat. At 10am and again at 10.45am we received updated coordinates from several contact persons and forwarded them to the coastguard. At 10.55am the coastguard told us that they had found some travellers in this area but that there were several boats. At 11am we informed the initial contact person about the ongoing rescue operation and at about 11.10am several contact persons confirmed to us that the boat in distress had been rescued.

At 10.40am we were also informed about a boat in distress close to the Greek island of Chios, but in this case we were not provided with coordinates (case 5). We spoke to the Greek coastguard, which urged us to ask the travellers to call the emergency hotline 112 by themselves, in case we were not able to forward GPS coordinates to them. We informed our contact person accordingly; however, at 11.10am she called us back and told us that the group of travellers had been rescued in the meantime.

Finally, at 2.11pm another support network informed us about their contact to a boat in distress, the position of which was unclear (case 6). We urged the contact person to ask the travellers to call the emergency hotline 112 or the coordination centre of the Greek coastguard directly and provided her with its phone number. 30 minutes later we learned the support network had lost contact to the boat already 5 hours earlier. In the following hours we were not able to re-establish contact neither to the travellers on board nor to the contact person.