Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 23rd of October 2015

Case name: 2015_10_23-AEG108
Situation: Alarm Phone working on 2 distress cases in the Aegean Sea
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Cases: On Friday the 23rd of October 2015, the Alarm Phone was alerted to two emergency cases in the Aegean Sea.

We were alerted to the first distress situation at 1.20am when we received a call from someone who was in contact with people on a boat (case 1). Our informant told us that there were 80 people on board, including many women and children. She had already informed the Greek coastguard about this urgent case. When we reached one of the travellers directly at 1.30am he said that they were not at sea anymore but were back on Turkish mainland and needed help. We asked for updated coordinates which we then received shortly afterwards via WhatsApp. The man told us that one child had died and several people were in a bad medical condition. We were unable to verify the information about the child. They had already called the international emergency number 112 and were waiting for help. They did not want us to notify the police and said that they might try and wait until the morning and then attempt the border crossing once more.

At 6.46am, the same person who informed us about case 1 told us about a second case, this time between Turkey and Samos Island/Greece. She told us that there were 35 people on a boat and passed on one of their phone numbers. We tried to reach them but the communication was interrupted. Shortly afterwards, at 7.30am, our informant confirmed that they had safely reached Samos Island.