02/01: 14 people travelling to Rhodes all drowned

03.01.2020 / 00:37 / Aegean Sea

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 2nd January 2020
Case name: 2020_01_02-AEG645
Situation: 14 people travelling to Rhodes all drowned
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Aegean Sea

Summary of the Case:
At 09:18h CET on 2 January 2020 the Alarm Phone was contacted about a boat with 14 travellers (3 women, 11 men) travelling towards the Greek Island of Rhodes. The travellers had departed from Fethiye, Turkey. We were informed that they had last shared a position in Turkish waters at 22:15h on 1 January 2020. We did not manage to establish direct contact with the travellers. At 09:30h on 2 January 2020 we called the Greek Coastguard (CG) who told us that they had already received information about the boat and that it had been intercepted to Turkey. After initial difficulties contacting the Turkish CG, we successfully established a connection with the Turkish CG at 09:58h. The Turkish CG informed us that they had been contacted about this boat previously and were in the process of searching for it.
The relatives who had contacted us had initially heard that the boat had been intercepted to Turkey and the travellers had been taken to a Turkish detention centre.
However on 4 January 2020 we were contacted again by the relatives of the travellers and discovered that the boat had sunk and all of the people on board had drowned. 8 bodies were recovered (3 women, 5 men), and 6 remain missing.
The Alarm Phone communicated with the friends and family of the drowned people many times since the drownings. Several of the bodies had already been identified, but for the majority identification was very difficult or not possible. Syrian relatives (both in Syria and with residence permits in Germany), were unable to get VISAs to travel to Turkey to identify the bodies.
On 9 January 2020, we discovered that the sister of the relatives we had been speaking to had been identified as amongst the dead and we were finally able to definitively confirm that this boat had sunk, and all the people on board are presumed dead.
We will not forget them.
Last update: 09:54 Mar 04, 2020
Credibility: UP DOWN 0
Layers »
  • Border police patrols
     
    While the exact location of patrols is of course constantly changing, this line indicates the approximate boundary routinely patrolled by border guards’ naval assets. In the open sea, it usually correspond to the outer extent of the contiguous zone, the area in which “State may exercise the control necessary to prevent infringement of its customs, fiscal, immigration or sanitary laws” (UNCLOS, art. 33). Data source: interviews with border police officials.
  • Coastal radars
     
    Approximate radar beam range covered by coastal radars operating in the frame of national marine traffic monitoring systems. The actual beam depends from several different parameters (including the type of object to be detected). Data source: Finmeccanica.
  • Exclusive Economic Zone
     
    Maritime area beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea in which the coastal state exercises sovereign rights for the purposes of exploring and exploiting, conserving and managing the natural resources, whether living or non-living, the seabed and its subsoil and the superjacent waters. Its breadth is 200 nautical miles from the straight baselines from which the territorial sea is measured (UNCLOS, Arts. 55, 56 and 57). Data source: Juan Luis Suárez de Vivero, Atlas of the European Seas and Oceans
  • Frontex operations
     
    Frontex has, in the past few years, carried out several sea operations at the maritime borders of the EU. The blue shapes indicate the approximate extend of these operations. Data source: Migreurop Altas.
  • Mobile phone coverage
     
    Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) network coverage. Data source: Collins Mobile Coverage.
  • Oil and gas platforms
     
    Oil and gas platforms in the Mediterranean. Data source:
  • Search and Rescue Zone
     
    An area of defined dimensions within which a given state is has the responsibility to co-ordinate Search and Rescue operations, i.e. the search for, and provision of aid to, persons, ships or other craft which are, or are feared to be, in distress or imminent danger. Data source: IMO availability of search and rescue (SAR) services - SAR.8/Circ.3, 17 June 2011.
  • Territorial Waters
     
    A belt of sea (usually extending up to 12 nautical miles) upon which the sovereignty of a coastal State extends (UNCLOS, Art. 2). Data source: Juan Luis Suárez de Vivero, Atlas of the European Seas and Oceans