Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 07th of February 2023

Case name: 2023_02_07 - ATL - 009

Situation: 49 people in distress in the Atlantic Ocean, probably was a shipwreck with 42 people rescued by Salvamento Maritimo and 7 people dead

Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Atlantic Ocean

Summary of the Case:In the early afternoon of Tuesday the 7th of February 2023 the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted by a relative to a group of 49 travelers, including 10 women and two children in distress in the Atlantic Ocean. The travelers had left from TanTan, Morocco in the morning at 5:00 CET the day before (6th of February). We were not able to establish a direct contact to the travelers, since the relative had no phone number of the travelers. We relayed all the information we had to the Spanish Search and Rescue organization Salvamento Maritimo via E-Mail. When calling Salvamento Maritimo they recommended us to get into contact with other Spanish authorities to learn more about ongoing or successful rescue operations. We contacted Guardia Civil, confirming following our informaton that the 49 people are still at sea. During the night we did not receive any new information. Since by that time we had been alerted to several boats in distress in the Atlantic Ocean we published those information via Twitter the next morning (8th of February): https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1623246951364849664
During the afternoon we were contacted by another relative whose infos fit to this group of travelers, since the number of men, women and children, as well as place and time of departure were matching. We received a phone number of one of the travelers, but we were not able to establish a direct contact.
Since we did not receive any new information, we did some research using different articles who reported different rescue operations. In the evening of 9th of February we found several reports about a shipwreck from a boat with 42 survivors and 7 dead people. Since both relatives had not have contact to their travelling family members we assume the shipwreck might be the group of people of that case. We closed that case as “Shipwreck, 42 people rescued by SM, 7 people dead ".