11/03: 24 travellers in distress in the Central Med, fate unknown

12.03.2022 / 09:12 / Central Mediterranean Sea

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 11th March 2022

Case name: 2022_03_11-CM047

Situation: 24 travellers in distress in the Central Med, Alarm Phone not able to find out what happened to their boat.

Status of WTM Investigation: fate unknown

Place of Incident: Central Mediterranean

Summary of the case: On Sunday the 13th of March 2022, the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted by a relative to a group of 24 travellers, 16 men, eight women and a child, in distress in the Central Mediterranean Sea. The travellers had left from Sfax a couple of days before in the evening. We were not able to reach the travellers directly, but immediately relayed all the information we had to the relevant search and rescue authorities. However, the Tunisian coastguard told us that they could not carry out a search and rescue operation due to bad weather conditions and the Italian coastguard remained unwilling to give us any information about ongoing search and rescue efforts. The relatives of the travellers were getting increasingly worried as time passed without any news and weather conditions in the region deteriorated. We never managed to find out what happened to the travellers. We called the Tunisian coastguard many times asking for any news, but they continued to claim that they had to news about the travellers. We hope the travellers made it back to shore by themselves, but fear that the boat has become one of the many quiet shipwrecks in the Mediterranean.

Tweets about the case:
https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1503671668186783745?lang=ar-x-fm
https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1503671668186783745?s=09

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