<b>Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – December 18th 2020</b> <i>Case name</i>: 2020_12_18-AEG737 <i>Situation</i>: 150 people left Turkey for Italy, fate unclear <i>Status of WTM Investigation</i>: Concluded <i>Place of Incident</i>: Aegean Sea <i>Summary Case</i> In the early afternoon of December 18th, Alarm Phone was alerted to a boat carrying approximately 100-150 people who were fleeing Turkey intending to reach Italy. At 13.57h CET a relative of people on the boat called us to inform us of the case. The connection broke before they could relate a GPS position. The relative forwarded a GPS position shortly afterwards, which we forwarded to authorities at 14.15h CET via e-mail. At 16.00h CET authorities in Piraeus confirmed they had knowledge of the case but provided no further information. We continuously tried to establish contact to the boat in distress but remained unsuccessful for the remainder of the day. Throughout the evening we tried to reach port authorities and coast guards in Neapolis and Kythira, none of which answered our calls or provided any information on an ongoing rescue operation. In the morning of December 19th the Greek coast guard confirmed a search for the boat on December 18th which had been stopped now since the boat had not been found. Still, we remained unable to reach the people on the boat. At 16.50h CET we e-mailed authorities to request an update on ongoing search missions but received no news of the boat. We remain unable to establish direct contact to the boat throughout December 20th. Media reports suggest the boat might have arrived to Italy. We did not receive confirmation from relatives of people on the boat nor people on the boat directly. Twitter Chronology December 18th 18.05 CET https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1339980139992657920 December 19th 12.52 CET https://twitter.com/alarm_phone/status/1340263644840534016

This post was originally published on Watch the Med.