05/11: About 60 people from Syria/Lebanon to Italy

06.11.2022 / 14:09 / Eastern Med

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations –

Case name: 2022_31_08 - Eastern Med - 1053

Situation: 60/70 people, among them children, women and elderly, 7 days at sea before reaching Italy

Status of WTM Investigation: close

Place of Incident: Eastern Med

Summary of the Case:

On November the 5th, the Alarm Phone was contacted by a relative about at least 60 people in distress at sea between Greece and Italy. Among them were children, women and elderly people. They had left on the 1st of November, on a wooden boat from North Lebanon or south Syria towards Italy, and their engine had stopped running. The persons on the boat finally managed to fix the engine and continue. However, the weather conditions became dangerous and their relatives lost contact with them for a while. Around noon on November the 7th, we learnt that the boat was in distress in Italian search and rescue zone: the engine had stopped again and one person was giving birth. We alerted the Italian MRCC with the location. Late afternoon, relatives informed us that the people had arrived to Italy.

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