Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 3rd February 2021
Case name: 2021_02_03-CM354
Situation: 90 people rescued to Lampedusa
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean

Summary of the Case:
Shortly before 22:00h CET on 3 February 21 we received a call from a boat in distress. The boat was carrying around about 90 people from Egypt, Sudan, Bangladesh Libya and Pakistan. Among the passengers there were six women and six children and four babies. The weather was
deteriorating and the waves were picking up. Water was coming into the boat. The children were sick and everybody was exhausted.

We were able to get their position. We contacted MRCC Rome and relayed the position. As requested, we followed up with an email, copying in the UNHCR, Seawatch and the Maltese coastguard.

As the boat was in the Maltese Search and Rescue zone, we tried to phone RCC Malta. They did not answer any of their phones. We were forced to put out a tweet:
~90 people in distress in #Malta SAR!
A boat with ~90 people, among them women and children, just called #Alarmphone. They fled from #Libya and ask for urgent help. We alerted authorities to launch an immediate rescue.
@Armed_Forces_MT, do your duty!

We were able to reconnect with the boat and receive updated positions around 23:00h, 00;30h, 02:30h, 05:00h and 06:30h. We passed all of those positions on to the coastguard.

At 07:16h we called the boat who told us that they could see an aeroplane. They also sent us an updated position. It was clear that by now they were drifting. The aeroplane was
Sea-Watch’s Moonbird, who also informed the Coastguard about the whereabouts of the boat.

At 09:22, we learnt from a journalist on Twitter that a boat matching this case was being rescued and taken to Lampedusa. We closed the case. Boza, welcome to Europe.