Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 23rd of September 2022

Case name: 2022_09_23-ATL113

Situation: 63 travelers in distress in the Atlantic Ocean, outcome not concluded

Status of WTM Investigation: unclear

Place of Incident: Atlantic Ocean

Summary of the Case: On Friday the 23rd of September 2022, in the early morning the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted by a relative to a group of 63 travelers, including 13 women and 4 children, in distress in the Atlantic Ocean. The travelers had left in the early morning the day before (22th of September) from Guelmin, Morocco in a green blue zodiac boat heading towards Lanzarote. We directly relayed the information to the Spanish search and rescue organization Salvamento Maritimo. The following hours and days we constantly tried but were not able to establish a direct contact to the travelers. After two days without any news from the relative nor Salvamento Maritimo we tweeted concerning this and three other boats in the Atlantic Ocean: “As #TropicalStorm #Hermine hits the #CanaryIslands 4 boats to which we were alerted are in distress in the #Atlantic. ~200 people, incl. children, are on their way to the islands & face adverse weather conditions. Authorities are alerted and we expect swift rescue operations.” (21:54 CEST, 25th of September https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1574125195568287750:).

During the next day we could not reach the people on the boat, we did not learn about any arrivals matching this case from Salvamento Maritimo and the relative did not hear from the travelers either. The 26th of September at 14:06 CEST we tweeted again: "We still don't know the whereabouts of the 4 boats to which we were alerted on the #CanaryRoute. There is no contact to any of them. Competent authorities are only sharing vague information about their activities & are not confirming any rescue. Where are these people?" (https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1574369778566942720).

Another two days without any new information about this case passed, so we decided to mention the boat indirectly in another tweet, informing about other boats who we were in contact with as well: "We can confirm that the second boat in distress in the Atlantic was intercepted to #Morocco. The boat carried 42 people and left from #TanTan. We are relieved they were finally found after a week at sea. For 2 boats with ~100 people, we have no news. We hope they will be found."

We continued to try to find out about the remain of this boat. After approximately one week (30th of September) we decided to close that case without knowing what happened to the 63 travelers. We informed the relative and published another tweet concerning the boat (15:02 CEST): “We fear the worst for two boats on the #Canary route in the #Atlantic. They are missing for about 1 week in terrible weather conditions. The Spanish authorities also do not have any information about the ~100 people.”