Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 28th of December 2018
Case name: 2018_12_30-CM146
Situation: 28 people from Libya rescued to Malta
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean

Summary of the Case: On Friday the 28th of December 2018 the Alarm phone shift team were alerted to a rubber boat in distress carrying 28 people who had left from Libya. At 5.10pm CET we contacted the Maltese coast guard as the boat was already close to the Maltese Search and Rescue Zone. We informed them of the case providing the GPS position and the Thuraya contact number for the people on the boat. As the time went on the travellers began to panic as water was entering their boat. For several hours we stayed in constant contact with them, recharging their Thuraya phone credit and trying to reassure them. We, and other actors, kept updating the coastguard with new GPS positions, as there had been some confusion regarding the format of the coordinates we had been provided. The coast guard appeared to be engaged in a search for the boat and had begun direct communication with the travellers via their Thuraya phone. Just after midnight we began to see search and rescues activity by air and sea in the area where the boat was. We then learned from the people on the boat that they have lights and will try to illuminate their boat to get seen by the rescue forces. We immediately passed this information to the Maltese coast guard, who finally confirmed at 1.05am on Saturday the 29th of December that a rescue operation was currently underway. Soon after we received confirmation from a nearby rescue boat that the boat had been rescued by the Maltese coastguard.