Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 1st July 2021

Case name: 2021_07_01-WM639
Situation: 12 travelers in distress close to Tangier, Morocco. Rescued by the Moroccan Navy.
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the Case:
In the early morning of the 1st of July 2021, the Alarm Phone was alerted to a boat in distress by a family member of one of the travelers. There were 12 people (2 women, 10 men) on the boat who had left from Tangier, Morocco around midnight. At 07h30 CEST, we received a GPS location from them and managed to talk to them on the phone. They were very stressed and said that their boat was sinking. As they were close to the Moroccan coast, they agreed that we would alert the Moroccan authorities. So, we called the Maritime Rescue Coordination center (MRCC) in Rabat at 07h42 CEST and passed them all information we had. The officer on the phone said they would send a rescue ship. We also informed the Moroccan and Spanish Search and Rescue authorities via e-mail. At 09h12 CEST, the Moroccan authorities stated that hey had not yet found the boat. In another phone call with the travelers, they appeared very desperate. Our shift team told them that rescue was on the way. When we called the MRCC Rabat again at 09h54 CEST, they stated that the boat had „returned to land by own means“. As we had just talked to the travelers some minutes before, this did not seem possible to us. At 09h58 CEST, we received an updated GPS location, and transferred it to the authorities. At 10h00 CEST, the MRCC Rabat confirmed that they were still looking for the boat. In a phone call to the Spanish Search and Rescue organization Salvamento Marítimo (SM) in Tarifa at 12h00 CEST, they informed us that he boat had been found by the Moroccan Navy. This was confirmed shortly afterwards by a relative of someone on the boat. In the evening, a person from the boat confirmed as well to be back in Morocco.