Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 11th May 2022

Case name: 2022_05_11-ATL048

Situation: 54 travellers in distress in the Atlantic Sea for many days, several reported dead, the rest of the travellers remain missing.

Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Atlantic Sea

Summary of the case: On Wednesday the 11th of May 2022 shortly before midnight, the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted by a relative to a group of 54 travellers, including nine women and three children, in distress in the Atlantic Sea. The travellers had left from Guelmim in the early hours of the morning on a green rubber boat, heading towards Lanzarote. We reached the travellers who told us that they were left adrift as their engine had broken down and that their boat was taking in water. They also managed to pass on their GPS position to us. We immediately alerted the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo to the distress of the travellers. Throughout the night we stayed in contact with the travellers and forwarded their updated positions to Salvamento Maritimo when possible. During our calls we could hear that the panic onboard was increasing. However, at around 05.00 CEST we lost contact to the boat. Over the following days we kept trying to contact the travellers with no result. We learned about several rescue operations carried out by Salvamento Maritimo but none of these could be matched with the boat we had been alerted to. In the meantime, the relatives of the travellers grew increasingly worried as time passed and they had no news of their loved ones.
Almost five days after their departure, on the 15th of May, we finally managed to reach the travellers. They were exhausted and had no more drinking water. They told us that people onboard were dying one by one. The connection was not good and it was therefore not possible to get their updated GPS position, but they told us that they were close to the Moroccan coast. We called the Guardia Civil to relay this information and they told us that the Moroccan rescue authorities were conducting a search and rescue operation. We therefore immediately forwarded the information we had to the Moroccan rescue authorities. We were not able to match this boat with any of those picked up by the Moroccan navy and therefore do not know with certainty what happened to the travellers. We hope that they managed to make it to shore by themselves. Our thoughts and deepest solidarity are with the friends and families of those reported dead by the travellers and those possibly still missing.