23/11: 52 travellers intercepted in the Atlantic Sea by the Moroccan navy

24.11.2021 / 20:00 / Atlantic

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 23rd November 2021

Case name: 2021_11_23-WM793

Situation: 52 travellers in distress in the Atlantic Sea, intercepted by the Moroccan navy.

Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Atlantic Sea.

Summary: On Tuesday the 23rd November 2021, the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted by a relative to a group of 52 travellers, including eight women, two of which pregnant, in distress in the Atlantic Sea. The travellers had left from Tan Tan the previous morning at around 02.00 CET on a white rubber boat. The relative told us that the travellers were lost at sea. We alerted the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo to the distress of the travellers, forwarding all the information. At 04.20 CET we spoke to the travellers again. They were still at sea and told us that their engine had broken down and they were out of drinking water. We also managed to get their updated GPS position, which we forwarded to Salvamento Maritimo. At 6.22 CET Salvamento Maritimo confirmed to us on the phone that they had sent a rescue vessel, but that they estimated it would take them another two and a half hours to reach the travellers. However, at 10.03 CET Salvamento Maritimo told us that the Moroccan rescue authorities had taken over the responsibility for the operation and were intercepting the travellers. Shortly after, the relative told us that the travellers had been intercepted.
Credibility: UP DOWN 0
Layers »
  • 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