Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 20th September 2020
Case name: 2020_09_20-WM485
Situation: Alarm Phone alerted to boat with 5 travellers from Al Hoceima, finally rescued and brought to Motril.
Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded
Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean
Summary
On Sunday the 20th of September at 23.18 CET, the Alarm Phone was alerted by a relative to a boat carrying five travellers. The travellers had left from Al Hoceima at around 06.00 the same morning and were heading towards Motril. Over the following hour we gathered more information from the relative about the distress case. We were informed that the travellers had last had contact to their families at around 21.00 and at this time their engine was already broken. Neither we nor the relative was able to reach the travellers, and despite continuously trying we never managed to establish direct contact to the boat. At 00.39 we called the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo and alerted them to the distress of the travellers. They told us that they were already aware of the situation. However, they refused to commence a search and rescue operation without receiving a position of the boat. In a call to Salvamento Maritimo at 02.31 they told us that they were working on the case, but were not willing to tell us which efforts were made to localise the travellers. Throughout the night they refused to give us any more information. At 08.17 we called the Spanish guardia civil and informed them about the travellers. They were also aware of the case but told us that they were not carrying out search and rescue in the area. At 08.35 we called the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre in Morocco who told us that they had not rescued a boat matching our description, but that there were ongoing search and rescue operations in the area. At 13.30 we called the Moroccan rescue authorities again who told us that a vessel was about to disembark rescued travellers but that they did not yet have information about the rescue operations. However, in the evening at 18.15 they told us that the boat we were looking for was not amongst the ones rescued.
We stayed in contact with relatives and with the authorities and continuously tried reaching the travellers. In addition we published information about the case on social media and drew attention to the fact that we were not able to get a clear confirmation that search and rescue efforts were being made to ensure the safety of the travellers.
Only at 13.45 the following day did we receive confirmation from Salvamento Maritimo that the travellers had been rescued and brought to Motril, after spending over 36 hours at sea.



Tweets about the case:
“Yesterday night, a relative informed Alarm Phone of a boat departed from #AlHoceima, with 5 people on board. We immediately alerted authorities.
@salvamentogob
went to search them this morning, but since then no news. The search for the missing must continue!”
https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1308135401501097984?s=21