Status: 11/14/2021 5:39 p.m.
Eight people were killed on the journey from Africa to the Canary Islands – their boat apparently drifted for a week without propulsion in the sea. 500 people were rescued from two boats off the Calabrian coast.
Eight migrants died while crossing a small open boat from Africa to the Spanish Canary Islands. The other 54 boat occupants from countries south of the Sahara could have been rescued, the sea rescue announced on Twitter.
Yacht crew discovered boat
The boat was discovered late on Saturday evening in the Atlantic about 75 kilometers south of Gran Canaria by a French yacht, the crew of which alerted the authorities. A rescue cruiser then picked up the survivors and the bodies.
Three of the people were in such a life-threatening condition that they had to be picked up by a helicopter from the rescue cruiser and flown to a clinic. Of the others, nine more needed medical treatment after arriving at the port of Arguineguín in southwest Gran Canaria. How long the boat had been underway was initially not known. However, it had been without a drive for about a week, said the sea rescue.
Since the beginning of the year, according to UN figures, 17,500 people have dared to cross the open Atlantic from Africa to the Canary Islands and thus to the EU in small boats. How many died on the way is unknown.
500 people saved off the Calabrian coast
According to Italian authorities, the coast guard rescued more than 500 boat migrants off the coast of the southern Italian region of Calabria and brought them to the port of Roccella Ionica. The Ansa news agency reported that around 300 Egyptians and Syrians were at the mercy of a fishing boat on Sunday night.
Late on Sunday morning, the financial police rescued another boat with more than 200 men and unaccompanied minors, mostly from Egypt and Syria. This year, as of Friday, around 57,800 migrants have reached Italy in boats. In the same period last year it was around 31,200.