Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 24th of June 2018
Case name: 2018_06_24-WM268
Situation: Alarm Phone alerted to three distress cases between Morocco and Spain.
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean Sea

Summary of the Case: On Sunday the 24th of June, the Alarm Phone shift team was alerted to three boats in distress in the strait of Gibraltar. One boat was rescued by the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo (SM) whilst the two others were rescued by the Moroccan navy and brought back to Morocco.


At 4.53am, we received news that a boat with 13 people had left the Moroccan coast close to Cap Spartel at 1:30 am local time. We try to reach the boat but the connection was difficult. At 6.30am, we were finally able to receive their position and called SM to pass along the information. We again tried to reach the boat but we could not. Finally, at 7.17am, we received confirmation that SM rescued them and brought them to Spain.

At 6.34 am the Alarm Phone received a call about a boat with 9 people, including 1 woman, that had left from Cap Spartel at 4am Moroccan time. We could not reach the boat although we tried several times. At 6.50 am, we were informed that the boat was losing air. Finally, at 6.53am we managed to make contact with them. The boat was losing air, but they had a pump and so managed to pump air into the boat while trying to row. They were unable to send a position, so we called SM with the information that we had. A while later, we received the position of their boat and passed it on to SM. At 9.30am, the travellers informed us that they had a huge hole in their boat, and asked us to call the Marine Royale (MR) right away. We called the Marine Royale with their position. We continued to stay in touch with both MR and SM and send them the position of the boat as it was a very urgent situation. We tried to contact the boat for several hours, with no success. Finally, at 4.52pm we received confirmation that the travellers had been saved and brought back to Morocco.

At 8.55am, The Alarm Phone was informed that 10 people, including 2 women had left the coast of Morocco at 6 am local time close to Cap Spartel. The boat was not reachable until 10am, when we received their position. We called SM and passed along the information. Again, we could not reach the boat for a long while. At 11.44am, we received confirmation that the boat had been brought back to Morocco by the Marine Royale.