03/06: 5 men left from Al Hoceima, rescued to Motril.

04.06.2021 / 12:15 / Western Mediterranean Sea

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations –3rd June 2021

Case name: 2021_06_03-WM624

Situation: 5 men left from Al Hoceima, Morocco, rescued to Motril, Spain.

Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the case:

On the 3rd of June 2021 at 17h32 CEST, a relative informed our hotline about a boat in distress. There were five men who had started from Al Hoceima, Morocco, heading towards Motril on a black rubber boat. We could not get through to the travelers and could not find out about their GPS location. At 17h52 CEST, our shift team called the Spanish Search and rescue organization Salvamento Marítimo (SM) in Almería. They refused to take the data about the distress case and said we should call the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC) in Madrid. Our shift team did so and passed them all information, also via e-mail. At 20h45 CEST, the MRCC Madrid confirmed that they had passed the information to SM Tarifa and Almería. Both of the coastguards refused to pass information about their rescue operations to our shift teams, when we called them around 21h00 CEST. The next day around 11h00 CEST, we could confirm the rescue of the travelers, because a relative had recognized their faces on pictures of a rescue to Motril.

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