Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 1st of June 2021

Case name: 2021_06_01-CM452

Situation: 71 travelers in distress in the Libyan SAR zone. European and Libyan authorities do not share information on the status of rescue operations. The travelers were probably intercepted by the so-called Libyan coast guard.

Status of WTM Investigation: Unconfirmed

Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the case:

On the 1st of June 2021, the Alarm Phone was called by a relative of someone on a boat in distress. They passed us the information that a fisherman had seen the 71 travelers close to Al Khums. The relative passed us the number of the Thuraya phone on board. When we got through to the travelers, but hardly understood each other and we could not get a GPS location from them. They said that there were many women, some of them pregnant, and children on board.

Our shift team informed the Italian, Maltese and Libyan authorities about the distress case by e-mail at 09:45 CEST.

At 16h51 CEST, we could get a GPS location from them, located in the Libyan Search and Rescue zone. We passed it on to the competent authorities via e-mail at 17h28 CEST, adding the information that some of the people had told us about injuries.

From then on, our shift team could not reach the travelers anymore.

At 22h20 CEST, the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre in Malta told us on the phone that they were not going to coordinate the rescue operation.

At 22h27 CEST, we informed all authorities about the merchant vessel SEA BULL in the vicinity of the last postion we had from the boat in distress, asking them to coordinate a rescue operation with the crew of the merchant vessel. Our shift team had also monitored the Frontex plane Osprey in the area of the distress case.

For the next two days, we could not reach the travelers anymore and did not get any clear information from European nor from Libyan authorities. On the 3rd of June, we closed the case, assuming from media information that the group of people had been picked up by the so-called Libyan coast guard already on the 1st of June.