18/03: Boat in the CM catches fire, number of casualties unknown.

19.03.2021 / 10:44 / Central Mediterranean Sea

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 18th March 2021
Case name: 2021_03_18-CM385
Situation: Alarm Phone alerted a boat which caught fire in the Central Med. After hours the survivors were brought back to Libya.
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean
Summary of the case:

In the night of the 18th of March 2021, the Alarm Phone shift team received a direct call from a wooden boat in the Central Mediterranean Sea. The travellers had left from Zuwara at 20.00 CET the previous evening. They told us that one engine had caught fire and that they therefore were in urgent distress. We immediately tried calling the so-called Libyan coastguard, but were not able to reach them. We then tried to reach the Italian and Maltese coastguards, but also had problems connecting with them. Only at 03.07 CET did we manage to give the information to the Italian coastguard via phone. However, they denied that it was their responsibility. At 03.32 CET we sent an email to the relevant authorities, as well as UNHCR and rescue NGOs alerting them to the urgent situation of the travellers. In the meantime, we stayed in contact with the travellers and some of their relatives who were on land. From relatives we learned that one person onboard had been burned by the fire. According to the relative, however, the travellers had managed to throw the burning engine overboard and were therefore now adrift. The travellers themselves told us at 04.37 CET that water was entering their boat, and 20 minutes later we managed, for the first time, to get a position of the boat. We updated all authorities via email with the additional information we managed to gather. In a call with a relative at 04.57, the relative told us that the boat had started with around 100 people, but that about half of them had died already during the fire incident. We were not able to confirm this information directly with the boat. During the morning we were able to get updated positions from the boat, which we forwarded to the authorities. From staying in touch with the travellers, we could also follow as the situation deteriorated. At 09.26 we could see that the rescue NGO vessel Ocean Viking was heading towards the direction of the boat in distress. At 10.03 CET we last reached the travellers. However, we were not able to understand each other as people were shouting and panicking on the boat, and then the line broke off.
At 10.54 CET we sent out the following tweet:
Alarm Phone was alerted during the night to about 70-100 people close to the Libyan coast off Zuwara. They are in panic as their boat seems to have caught on fire. Authorities are informed. Waste no time, help is urgently needed!

At 12.05 we were informed that the so-called Libyan coastguard had rescued 45 travellers and brought them back to Libya. According to the so-called Libyan coastguard, there were five people missing after the incident, which differed a lot from the information we had received from the relative earlier. As we never managed to speak to the travellers again, we were not able to establish the correct number of people missing.
We condemn the European migration politics, forcing people to embark on this deadly journey. All our solidarity is with the friends and families of those who have lost their lives, and with the survivors of this traumatic incident.
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

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