25/01: 60 travellers started from Laâyoune to reach Canary Islands, arrived in Fuerteventura

26.01.2021 / 14:42 / Western Mediterranean

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 25th of January 2021

Case name: 20212501-WM561

Situation: 60 travellers started from Laâyoune, Morrocco, and made Boza to Fuerteventura

Status of WTM Investigation: concluded

Place of Incident: Western Mediterranean

Summary of the Case:

On 24th of January 2021 the Alarm Phone got called by a community member who informed about a convoi of 60 persons, among them 8 women and 3 children. They have started from Laâyoune in a rubber boat in the early morning this day to reach the Canary Islands. The shift team couldn’t establish contact to the travellers. In the first minutes of 25th of January 2021 the community member asked the shift team to call the Spanish search and rescue organisation Salvamento Maritimo (SM). We did this at 00.32h CET and the officer took down all information. Still no contact to the travellers possible. When the Alarm Phone called SM again around 10h CET they said to be searching for the boat and we should call back later. In the next call at 14.09h CET Salvamento Maritimo informed us that they stopped searching for the boat this day. They would continue tomorrow morning. We search in Social Media for information about the missing ones but couldn’t find anything. In the evening at 21.35h the community member came back to us and reported the safe arrival of the group on Fuerteventura. This information was confirmed to us by Salvamento Maritimo in Gran Canaria.

Last update: 12:52 Apr 29, 2021

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