Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 8th of November 2017

Case name: 2017_11_08-WM177
Situation: 7 travellers starting from Tangier, rescued by Salvamento Maritimo
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean

Summary of the Cases: On Wednesday the 8th of November at 4.08am a contact person alerted the Alarm Phone to a boat carrying seven travellers, amongst them two women, one of whom was pregnant, forwarding us their phone number and position. They had left the previous night at 7pm from a beach close to Tangier. As their inflatable boat did not have a motor, they were forced to row. Their position at 4.25am showed that they were still inside the Moroccan search and rescue zone. At 4.41am we reached the travellers, who were still doing alright, and wanted to continue on their own for a bit longer. Around 5am we notice on vesselfinder, that a boat operated by the Spanish search and rescue orgainsation Salvamento Maritimo (SM) was not too far south of the position we received from the travellers. We therefore agreed with the travellers, who were also tired from rowing, that we would call SM and alert them to the distress case. At 5.16am we called SM and passed on the information we had, and they confirmed that they would initiate a search and rescue operation. On vesselfinder we could follow the trajectory of the SM boat, and as it looked as though they were carrying out a rescue operation, we called them back at 5.50am to ask if they had any update on the case. They told us that they had just rescued a boat with eight travellers on board, and were looking for another one with ten travellers. However, the description of the eight people did not match the travellers we were in contact with, as there were no women amongst the rescued travellers. After this point, it was no longer possible to establish contact to the travellers. At 8.20 we called SM again, and they informed us that they were still searching for the travellers, both with their boat and with a helicopter. So far, they had managed to rescue the two boats carrying eight and ten travellers. At 11.37am the contact person informed us that the travellers had been rescued and brought to Spain, which was confirmed by SM shortly after.