Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 28th March 2021
Case name: 2021_03_28-CM390
Situation: A boat carrying 47 travellers was probably intercepted by the so-called Libyan coastguard. This information was however not confirmed.
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the Case: Around 9:30h CEST of Sunday the 28th of March, the Alarm Phone was called by a boat in distress that had left from Zawiya between 2h and 3h the previous morning. The boat was carrying 47 travellers, including 5 children and 8 women, two of
which were pregnant. The travellers told us that the situation on the boat was very bad, as the boat was also starting to deflate. After
having received a GPS position at 09:55h we called the Italian coastguard and passed on all of this information. At 10:24h and 11:00h when we received updated positions, we passed it on to authorities and relevant NGOs via email. At 12:43 when we spoke back to the travellers they told us that they could see an airplane above
them and a ship on the distance and that they were heading towards the ship. They also informed us that more water was entering the
boat. As the situation was deteriorating at 13:14h we called the so-called Libyan coastguard who took the information and told us to call back later. We then identified the boat which the travellers could see in the distance as probably being “Asso Ventinove” we therefore tried to call the Asso offshore company several times, but our calls were not answered. At 14:30h we received a new GPS position and forwarded it to authorities. During the afternoon and the night, we unfortunately lost contact with the travellers who were no longer
picking up our calls. The following day, around 14:00h we received a call from the travellers, while they didn’t speak, from the background noise it sounded like they were at sea. When we called back, however we were no longer able to reach them. The Italian coastguard did not give us any information. In the night, we received
a message from a relative of one of the travallers who had called us earlier in the day asking us if we had news, he told us that the boat had been intercepted by the so-called Libyan coastguard and that the people were now in detention. We were never able to confirm this information.