17/10: 12 travellers in distress in Western Med, fate unknown

18.10.2021 / 18:27 / Western Mediterranean

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 17th October 2021

Case name: 2021_10_17-WM758

Situation: 12 travellers in distress in the Western Med, Alarm Phone was never able to find out what happened to the travellers.

Status of WTM Investigation: fate unknown

Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean

Summary: On Sunday the 17th of October 2021, the Alarm Phone shift was alerted by a relative to a group of 12 travellers in distress in the Western Mediterranean Sea. The travellers had left the previous day from Oran and were heading towards Almeria. The relative was worried, as they had lost contact to the boat. Our shift team never managed to establish a direct contact to the travellers. At 16.34 CEST we alerted the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvaemento Maritimo to the distress of the travellers, forwarding all information we had. When we later called Salvamento Maritimo, they told us that they had many rescue operations in the area, and it was therefore difficult to establish whether this boat was amongst the rescued. However, they told us that they had rescued two boats that could match the description we had given. The following days we kept trying to reach the travellers and to get more information to match the boat with one of those that had been rescued. However, we never reached the travellers and the relative was not able to obtain more information. We therefore cannot be sure exactly what happened to the travellers.

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