01/02: Around 63 travellers in the Atlantic intercepted by the Moroccan navy

Verified

  In Distress   Interception

02.02.2022 / 07:23 / Atlantic

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 1st February 2022

Case name: 2022_02_01-ATL022

Situation: Around 50 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 1st of February 2022, the Alarm Phone shift team received a direct call from a group of around 63 travellers, including 16 children and 12 women of which two pregnant, in distress in the Atlantic Sea. The travellers had left from Laayoune the day before on a grey rubber boat. The travellers were panicking, but we managed to get their GPS position. We immediately relayed this together with all other information we had to the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo as well as the Moroccan rescue authorities. Later in the day, we learned that the travellers had been intercepted by the Moroccan navy and brought back.

Tweets about the case: https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1488428937151758337?t=7uPKVrrJJ3qIN7vMOA62XQ&s=
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

Related Reports

16:17 Dec 07, 2020 / Western Mediterranean Sea Kms
06/12: Shipwreck off the Moroccan coast, 2 survivors, 6 bodies, 5 people remain missing
14:25 Jun 04, 2023 / Atlantic Kms
03/06: 48 travellers intercepted by the Moroccan navy in the Atlantic
18:07 Jan 17, 2022 / Atlantic Kms
16/01: 45 deaths in the Atlantic Sea as travellers are left in distress for 11 hours without assistance
17:01 Sep 23, 2022 / Atlantic Kms
22/09: 42 people in distress at the Atlantic Ocean, intercepted by the Moroccan navy
17:25 Sep 25, 2022 / Atlantic Kms
24/09: 55 people in distress at the Atlantic Ocean, intercepted by the Moroccan Navy