14/10: Around 80 travellers arriving to Sicily from Turkey

15.10.2021 / 18:33 / Central Mediterranean

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 14th October 2021

Case name: 2021_10_14-CM592

Situation: 80 people in distress on their way from Turkey to Italy, arrived to Sicily after many days at sea.

Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean

Summary of the case: On Thursday the 14th of October 2021 in the early hours of the morning, the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted by a relative to a group of 80 travellers, including 10 children and 10 women, two of them pregnant, in distress in the Central Mediterranean Sea. The travellers had left from Turkey on the 9th of October at around 04.00 CET, heading towards Italy. We were told that they had no life vests onboard. We managed to reach the people and got their GPS position showing that they were in the Italian search and rescue zone. They told us that they needed urgent rescue and people were panicking. We immediately forwarded the information we had to the Italian coastguard, urging them to carry out a search and rescue operation. Over the following hour we stayed in contact with the travellers who were getting increasingly desperate, after this time we were no longer able to reach them. The Italian coastguard refused to give us any information about their search and rescue operations, but the following afternoon we learned about a boat matching the description we had been given, which had arrived to Sicily.

Last update: 18:52 Apr 02, 2022

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