Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – July 25th 2020
Case name: 20200725-CM270
Situation: 96 people rescued to Malta
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean
Summary
In the evening of July 25th, Alarmphone was alerted to a boat in distress carrying 96 people, including 4 women and a baby. They reported they had barely any battery left on their phone, their motor had broken down and asked for urgent assistance. We forwarded the distress call including the boat’s location to authorities at 22.43 CEST via e-mail. We attempted to contact authorities via phone, but were unable to since our calls remained unanswered. At 00.20 CEST on July 26th the people in distress managed to convey an updated position and reported they had no life vests, no food or water left and there were 10cm of water in the boat while the health situationn of a lot of people was deteriorating. The updated position was forwarded to authoritie at 00.50. We also noticed the vessel MRIDIVE 230 anchored a distance away from the GPS position relayed by the people in distress. We were unable to reach authorities in Malta or staff from the MARIDIVE company via phone. We sent another e-mail with an updated GPS position at 03.40, which we also forwarded to the owners of a nearby oil platform Miskar Gas Field. Still, authorities in Malta did not answer our calls.

At 05.00 people on the boat called again, reporting that more and more water had been entering the boat, and that a number had called them stating “we are coming”. It remained unclear who this number belonged to. At 06.20 CEST our call was finally answered by authorities in Malta. However, the officer refused to provide any information on whether a rescue mission had been launched for this distress case. At the time of the call we received an updated position from the boat, which was forwarded to authorities via e-mail. At 10.58 people on the boat informed us one person had fainted and might have died, others had started to jump into the water, the boat was full with water and about to sink. This information was forwarded to authorities, which again refused to answer any of our calls. At 12.31 CEST people on the boat informed us that they had lost one of the people who had jumped into the water. We received another GPS position at 15.23 which was forwarded to authorities. Throughout the afternoon we received repeated calls from relatives asking what was going to happen to their family members. People on the boat reported a cargo vessel passing by close to them without stopping. Online we could observe the merchant vessel HEYDAR ALIYEV circling the boat in distress without intervening. At 20.50 CEST the people on the boat called us, stating very calmly that they estimate the boat could be stable for another 1 to 2 hours. 22 hours after first alerting authorities, still no MRCC had stated they were taking responsibility for this rescue; merchant vessels continued passing or merely standing by. There was no change to the situation by 00.26 CEST,July 27th when we contacted the vessel HEYDAR ALIYEV, again informing of the desperate situation of the people in distress and urging the vessel to provide assistance. We received an updated position at 01.52 CEST and forwarded it to authorities. Authorities in Malta continued to ignore our calls.

At 05.52 CEST, 31 hours after our first alert, an officer of the Armed Forces of Malta responded to our phone call but refused to provide any information to us. At 06.00 people on the boat reported that a vessel from the Armed Forces of Malta had approached them an distributed life vests but told the people on board they would not rescue them. By mid-morning we received confirmation that the people in distress had been rescued by the Armed Forces of Malta and taken to Malta, after authorities had left the boat adrift for a day and a half.

Twitter Chronology

July 26th

01.45 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287172997305040897

03.31 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287198935614918661

08.52 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287279730920763392

08.54 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287280024387821569

10.12 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287299704938795008

11.11 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287314696836657153

14.42 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287367617787961345

16.20 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287392391968817152

16.48 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287399339887910912

17.00 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287402771969462272

18.33 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287425753219465216

19.46 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287444099340083202

22.03 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287478763949830149

July 27th

05.59 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287598495118000128

12.33 CEST https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1287697527349948417