Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 29th of December 2015

Case name: 2015_12_29-AEG171
Situation: 4 groups of travellers stranded on Pasas and Kalimnos, all rescued; 2 boats in distress near Lesvos
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Cases: On Tuesday the 29th of December 2015 the Alarm Phone was informed about 4 groups of travellers who had stranded on the Greek islands of Pasas and Kalimnos. Furthermore, we were alerted to 2 boats in distress near the Greek island of Lesvos. The Alarm Phone can confirm the rescue of one of these boats, while the other one could not be reached after we alerted the Greek coastguard.

At 0.50am we were informed about a group of 12 travellers, including 6 children and 2 elderly women, who had stranded on the Greek island of Pasas six hours earlier (case 1). Although we were not able to reach the travellers directly, we called the Chios Refugee Support Group at 1.10am and forwarded the travellers’ GPS coordinates. The support group promised to immediately send a rescue vessel to the island. In a call to the responsible port authorities on the island of Chios at 1.25am we learned that they were expecting the arrival of several other boats on Pasas in the following hours and thus had instructed the vessel of the Chios Refugee Support Group to go to this island. At 2am a contact person informed us that the group had grown to 32 travellers, due to the arrival of another boat, and we forwarded this information to the support network.

At 6.10am a contact person informed us via Facebook about another group of 21 people, including 7 children and one person in a wheelchair, who had stranded on the same island, but at another beach (case 2). We talked briefly to the travellers and learned that they were not related to the previous groups and informed the Greek coastguard on Chios accordingly. They promised to send the rescue vessel also to this position, but asked us to inform the travellers that they have to wait until the previous rescue mission is completed. Later on we were informed about a third group stranded on the northern shore of Pasas (case 3), but in the course of the morning we received confirmation that all travellers on this island had been picked up and transferred to Chios.

Already at 5.25am we received the GPS position and phone number of a boat in distress east of the Greek island of Lesvos, with 50 people on board (case 4). We called the travellers directly and heard them shouting for help. Immediately afterwards, we alerted the Greek coastguard and forwarded all our information. Afterwards, we were not able to establish contact to the travellers again.

At 7.20am we were informed about another boat in distress close to Lesvos, with 45 travellers on board (case 5). We alerted the Greek coastguard and port authorities on Lesvos shortly afterwards and got confirmation for their rescue at about 9.40am.

Furthermore, on this day, we were informed about a group of stranded travellers on the Greek island of Kalimnos, who were rescued by the local police (case 6).