27/05: 50 travellers in distress in the Central Med, rescued.

28.05.2021 / 15:58 / Central Mediterranean Sea

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 27th May 2021
Case name: 2021_05_27-CM447
Situation: Alarm Phone alerted to 50 travellers who left from Tripoli, after hours of no contact a relative informed us that they had been rescued.
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean

Summary of the case:
On Thursday the 27th of May at 05.25 CEST the Alarm Phone shift team received a direct call from a boat in distress in the Central Mediterranean Sea. There were 50 travellers onboard the boat, including four women and six children. The travellers told us that they had departed from a beach west of Tripoli, and that they were in urgent distress as water was entering the boat and several people were sick. After this our connection broke down, and we never again managed to establish contact to the boat despite trying many times. At 14.28 CEST we sent an email to the Italian and Maltese coastguards, alerting them to the distress of the travellers. Shortly after, we learned from a relative who contacted us about the same boat that the travellers had been rescued. However, we were not able to establish where they would be brought to.

Credibility:

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