ResQ - people saving people

August 20th - September 10th
Everyone on board!
The ResQ People has finally arrived from Naples to Syracuse, ready to be operational again. On board the maritime crew is completed (on our ship there are nine seafarers) while the volunteers waiting on shore receive a call from Lia: “Buy your tickets, they are waiting for you.” All aboard, then! On the bridge, in the engine room and on the deck, together with the Head of Mission and the specialized volunteers from the different departments: doctor and nurse, cultural mediators, rescuers, logistician and the cook.
These weeks are necessarily intense: embarking supplies for the galley, checking inventories and restocking what is missing, doing the theoretical and practical trainings for the crew about rescue techniques, survivor care, life on the ship. Everything you need to know to be ready for a SAR operation at sea.
Monday 11th September
Sailing out
The ResQ People sets sail from Syracuse with a crew of 20 people from nine different Countries; it is heading to the search and rescue zone on the so-called Tunisian route. These are the most dramatic weeks in recent months in the central Mediterranean, with thousands of people risking their lives at sea and daily human rights violations.
Tuesday 12th September
Heading to SAR zone

We sailed to the SAR area and took advantage of this time to do the drills that could not be done in port, such as launching and recovering the two RHIBs  – Rigid Hull Inflatable Boats we use for the rescue – from the moving ship. As soon as we got within radio range, Channel 16 began to give us the dimension of the crisis that was unfolding at sea: one distress call after another, a continuous mayday relay from boats and aircraft, from the authorities and the civil fleet.

Wednesday 13th September
Rescue at night
Wednesday afternoon, among many instances of distress, we headed for a report from Colibrì, the monitoring and search aircraft run by the organization Pilotes Volontaires.
In the evening we spotted a light in the dark and at around 9 p.m. We launched our RHIBs into the water. We proceeded to rescue an iron boat with 49 people on board – exhausted from three days at sea. As soon as they were safe on the ResQ People, the second rescue began: another iron boat appeared in the darkness with 48 people on board, they were screaming in despair because their boat was sinking fast. We started the stabilization maneuvers and bought as much time as we could, but the boat was already full of water and they all went overboard. We rescued and hoisted 47 people into the RHIBs. Unfortunately, we recovered the lifeless body of a woman. She wanted to take her granddaughter to Europe. She didn’t make it, but the little girl did: she is safe on the deck of the ResQ People.
Shortly after 1 a.m. we recovered our RHIBs back on the ResQ People. We informed the maritime authorities and they assigned us the Place of Safety of Trapani to disembark the survivors.
Thursday morning
With the Italian Coast Guard

Sailing North, at dawn we heard a fishing vessel calling Lampedusa radio to report a Mayday and shortly afterwards we spotted the scene with our binoculars: it was an overloaded wooden boat. We informed the authorities, who urged us to contact the Coast Guard heading there. We radio them and follow their directions: we remained on the scene, monitoring the distress case until their arrival shortly thereafter. Just one minute for greetings and thanks – with arms rising from the decks and more formal words over the radio – and we resumed our  navigation while the Coast Guard CP proceeded to rescue the wooden boat.

Thursday 14th - Friday 15th
En route to Trapani
En route to Trapani
On board the ship, we take care of the shipwrecked people: medical checkups, showers, hot meals, a few chats, the essential information, and most of all sincere smiles exchanged with people who haven’t seen any for a long, long time.
What does it feel like on a rescue ship bound for a safe harbor? So many emotions all at once. The relief of those who have literally been pulled from the water and are finally safe. It is joy, at times: that of those who have seen death in the face, but death will have to return another day because Wednesday night there were ResQ People getting in the way.
And it is also endless sadness: because the second boat was sinking when we found them, and one woman didn’t make it.
So we laugh and we cry, on the wooden deck bringing the castaways ashore, we eat and quench our thirst, we get examined in the clinic, we shower, we sleep…we begin to hope again.
“Thank you, merci, merci!” they all say to us: their thanks we turn over to those who support ResQ, because if they are safe it is thanks to all of them.
Support the ship
Friday 15th September
H 6.12: disembarkation completed

The International Conventions say that a rescue ends only with the disembarkation in Place of safety, a safe port. We docked at the port of Trapani and began all the procedures to disembark the 96 people who were on board. Then handshakes, hugs and a few tears as one by one begin to disembark from the gangway. At 6:12 p.m., the last of the survivors who were on board the ResQ People set foot on the dock in Trapani: we can consider the rescue concluded.

From Saturday on...
Close a rotation, prepare the next one

The survivors disembarked, but our job is not over yet. We need to clean the ship, check everything that was consumed, got damaged or lost, debrief with the crew and organize the arrival of the new volunteers, go back to inventories, stockings and trainings…everything that’s needed to sail out again.

Help us saving people: support the ship with a donation. And welcome on board.

Support the ResQ People

Let’s keep in touch!

Sign up for the newsletter: we’ll keep you updated on our activities at sea and on land, events and cultural initiatives.

Sign up