Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 28th of June 2018

Case name: 2018_06_28-WM272
Situation: Alarm Phone alerted to emergency situations in the Western Med
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the Cases: On Thursday, the 28th of June 2018, our Alarm Phone shift team dealt with five emergency situations in the Western Mediterranean Sea.

Case 1: At 7.21am CEST, we learned through a contact person in Morocco about two boats that had left from Tangier/Morocco. Each boat carried 12 people, including 2 women on each. Soon after we received a phone number of one of the travellers. When we could not reach the boat, we contacted the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo (SM) at 7.47am and informed them about the boats. The Spanish authorities took down the details of the case and informed us that there were many distress cases off Morocco. Over the next hours we tried to contact the boats but without success. At 1.35pm when we spoke to SM and later to the Moroccan Navy, they told us that they had no information about the boat in question. At 3.34pm we learned from our contact person that both boats had been intercepted by the Moroccan Navy.

Case 2: At 9.27am CEST, we received information from a contact person about a boat in distress with 8 people on board. They had left several hours earlier from Tangier/Morocco. Later on, we received their GPS position which we passed on to SM at 9.54am. Our contact person informed us that they were in urgent distress, and so we decided to also inform the Moroccan Navy. At 10.39am the people from the boat called us and stated that they had serious problems. The battery of their phone was running out and they told us that a vessel had sailed past them without offering help. At 10.45am they told us that a cargo vessel was close to them. We forwarded the new information to SM. At 10.54am the Moroccan Navy confirmed that they had rescue assets close to the distress location. At 1.22pm we spoke to one of the travellers. He confirmed that they had been returned to Morocco by the Moroccan Navy. We then informed our initial contact person as well as SM about the rescue.

Case 3: At 10.44am CEST we received information about a boat that had again left from Tangier/Morocco, carrying 12 people, including 3 or 4 women. About half an hour later we received their GPS position. At 11.25am, SM confirmed that they would send an asset to the boat in distress. At 11.42am, the people on the boat informed us that they could see a red/orange vessel in their vicinity. At 12.25pm, the travellers confirmed that they had been rescued by SM. They were brought to Spain.

Case 4: At 5.10pm CEST we were informed about a boat carrying 5 people, including 2 women who had left from Tangier/Morocco. We learned that one person had gone overboard. He had been able to swim back to the beach, but since he carried the only phone, there were no ways to contact the remaining 5 travellers. We contacted both SM and the Moroccan Navy to see whether they had rescued the boat in question. At 8.05pm we received an email from MRCC Rabat, stating that the boat had been detected already in the morning and the travellers returned to Tangier.