Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 20th of March 2016

Case name: 2016_03_20-AEG238
Situation: Alarm Phone alerted to 3 emergency situations in the Aegean Sea
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Cases: On Sunday the 20th of March 2016, our Alarm Phone shift teams were alerted to 3 emergency situations in the Aegean region. One group had stranded on Pasas Island and needed support. They were presumably later transferred to Chios Island. One vessel in distress in Turkish waters was found and rescued by the Turkish coastguards. Another group had nearly reached Ro Island when their vessel flipped over and the group had to swim ashore. The Greek coastguards later found and transferred the group but two young girls could not be rescued, they had passed away already.

At 1.46am, one of our activist allies informed us about a group that had stranded on Pasas island (case 1). We reached the group of 25 people, including 7 women and children, and they told us that they had already stranded on the island 2 days earlier and needed support. We received an image from them, showing them sitting around a camp fire. We informed the Chios Port Authority at 2.03am and they confirmed that they would send a rescue vessel in the morning around 8.30am in order to transfer them to Chios. Afterwards, we were unable to reach the group again. We called the Chios Port Authority again in the afternoon and they could not confirm whether this group in question had been transferred but they stated that they were constantly going back and forth between Pasas and Chios so that it is very likely that the group had been found.

At 4.35am, we received a WhatsApp message informing us about a group of 45 people, including about 10 children (case 2). They had been travelling to Ro Island and shortly before reaching it the boat had capsized. Following their account, 2 people had gone missing. When we talked to them on the phone they were clearly distressed and very anxious. We reached out to the Greek coastguards at 5.10am and they confirmed that they knew about this case and were working on it. At 5.25am we learned that the Greek coastguards were on their way to the location. At 6.01am we talked to the group on the island again and they said that two young girls had gone missing. They said they were still trying to find them in the water but all people were very cold as they had all fallen into the water. At 7.12am, the people stated that they had been detected by the Greek coastguards. We then were unable to stay in touch with them afterwards but we learned from an informant of ours that the two little girls that had fallen into the water, had died. Later on we also found newspaper articles that talked about this case and the death of the two girls (see source 1 and 2).

At around the same time as case 2, we were informed by an activist ally about a boat carrying about 40 people that had entered a situation of distress (case 3). Our contact person said that their engine had broken. He had already alerted the Turkish coastguards and said he was monitoring the situation and reach out to us if he needed support. Our contact person remained in touch with the travellers and sent us updates. At 7.33am he informed us that the people had been found and rescued by the Turkish coastguards.