Just a few hours after departure, the ResQ People carried out a rescue. During the night between saturai and sunday, after receiving an alert via Navtex, the ResQ People reached a boat in distress and saved the 59 people on board. Their small wooden boat had departed from Zuwara, Libya, about 24 hours before. They had no fuel, water or food left.
Amongst the 59 people rescued there are 6 women, one in the final stage of pregnancy, and 17 minors. Survivors mainly come from Syria, Somalia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt, as well as from Yemen, Nigeria, Libya, the Gambia, Ivory Coast: a sad atlas of war, inequalities and poverty. During the evening, the ResQ People requested a Place of Safety to all the relevant maritime authorities.
Aboard our ship, we assist our guests. “If the ResQ People wasn’t there, they may be dead. But we arrived on time and they’re here, they’re safe” – says Lia Manzella, vicepresident of ResQ. “And they’re safe only thanks to the generosity of all the citizens that support ResQ: thank you!”
We alerted the Italian authorities of a critical case on board and asked for a medical evacuation of the patient: a young boy with previous, severe medical conditions that requested immediate attention at a hospital level. We headed as fast as we could in the direction of Lampedusa, Italy, where we were joined by the Italian Coast Guard (thanks!) who proceeded to evacuate the patient.
Late in the morning we were informed by Alarm Phone of a possible distress case between Libyan and Maltese SAR zone. The coordinates were around 100 nautical miles from our position – more than 11 hours – but since today we are the only rescue vessel in Central Med, we decide to go South. It’s a race against time – and we lost. When we arrive on the scene, near the oil platform of Sabratha, we only find an abandoned rubber boat. The Libyans were here before. The people on board were safe from the water, maybe, but returned to violence and human traffickers. A violation of human rights, funded by European Union.
Aboard the ResQ People we assist our guests: nurse and doctor check everybody, we prepare and serve breakfast, lunch and dinner, and we spend some time together while we must wait for the authorities to assign us a Place of Safety. Our cultural mediator improvised an Italian class: “Io mi chiamo“, my name is, “Da dove vieni?”, where are you from?
We have a Place of Safety assigned by the Italian authorities! We sailed to Pozzallo, where we arrived late in the evening. Joy explodes among the survivors: for being rescued from the sea and for being rescued by the Libyan hell. They are finally sure that no one will be returned to the human traffickers. We are going to Europe, we are going home.
