Rubber Boat News

At least 22 people drowned, including seven children, when a rubber boat carrying migrants sank off Turkey's northwest province of Canakkale, the local governor's office said on Friday, adding that search and rescue efforts continued.In a statement, the Canakkale governor's office said that two people had been rescued by the coast guard and two others had survived "by their own means" after the boat capsized.It said a plane, two helicopters, and a total of 18 vessels from the coast guard and other rescue authorities were involved in the search and rescue efforts…

MV Mito, a general cargo vessel owned by NYK Bulk & Projects Carriers Ltd. and managed by Hachiuma Steamship Co. Ltd., rescued two people in an inflatable rubber boat in distress off the coast of Guam on July 30.While sailing from Port Kembla in Australia to Naoshima in Kagawa prefecture, Japan, the ship discovered two people in an inflatable boat in distress due to engine failure about 80 nautical miles north of Guam and immediately rescued them. The two were in good health and handed over to the United States Coast Guard off the coast of Saipan on July 31. MV Mito.

The number of Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins seen around Hong Kong has jumped as the pause in high-speed ferry traffic due to the coronavirus allows the threatened species to make something of a comeback, scientists said.Marine scientist Lindsay Porter of the University of St. Andrews said the mammals - also known as Chinese white dolphins and pink dolphins - were moving back into parts of the Pearl River Delta that they typically avoided due to the ferries that connect Hong Kong and Macau.Dolphin numbers in the area had jumped by up to 30% since March when the ferry traffic was suspended…

At CMRE, it’s not just about the science. It’s about building trust and confidence in resilient systems. An interview with Dr. Catherine Warner, Director, NATO Center for Maritime Research and Experimentation, La Spezia, ItalyTell us a little about yourself and CMRE. What does CMRE do, and how do you see your mission evolving?I came here from the Pentagon, where I was the science advisor for the director of operational test and evaluation. My experience has been working with operators on systems that they’re getting ready to field.

India's two main ports said on Thursday they had been warned by the coastguard and intelligence officials that Pakistan-trained commandos have entered Indian waters to carry out underwater attacks on port facilities.The Mundra Port, run by Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd, and the state-owned Kandla Port had asked their employees and ship operators to be vigilant, port officials and the ports said in advisories seen by Reuters.Tensions between India and Pakistan have escalated since India revoked the special status of its portion of the Himalayan region of Kashmir on Aug.

Dozens of migrants trying to reach Europe drowned in the Mediterranean on Friday and 100 more were sent back to Libya, the United Nations said, while Italian authorities signalling opposition to more migration from Africa seized a rescue ship.The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR said 65 people drowned when their boat capsized off Tunisia, and 101 others who had been picked up at sea were returned to Libya, despite repeated warnings that it is not a safe country to send people back to.It was one the deadliest shipwrecks involving migrants trying to reach Europe via north Africa this year.Tripoli, a hub for migrants and refugees hoping to sail to Europe after a perilous trek through the Sahara…

An Italian charity ship was escorted into the port of Lampedusa by police on Tuesday after rescuing 49 Africans in the Mediterranean, with Interior Minister Matteo Salvini calling for the crew to be arrested.A judicial source said a magistrate had ordered that the boat, the Mare Jonio, be seized as an investigation is launched into allegations of aiding and abetting human trafficking.The vessel picked up the migrants, including 12 minors, on Monday after their rubber boat started to sink in the central Mediterranean…

Interior Minister Matteo Salvini said on Tuesday he would not let an Italian-flagged charity ship disembark 49 Africans rescued in the Mediterranean, setting up a fresh confrontation with humanitarian groups over migration.The Mare Jonio picked up the migrants, including 12 minors, on Monday after their rubber boat started to sink in the central Mediterranean, some 42 miles (68 km) off the coast of Libya.The vessel headed straight for the nearby Italian island of Lampedusa but was not granted permission to dock and is currently sailing close to land, awaiting further instructions.Salvini, who heads the anti-immigrant League party, has told non-governmental organisations that Italy's ports are closed to them…

ASL Environmental Sciences said that Dr. David Holland of New York University, in collaboraon with Dr. Natalya Gomez at McGill University, is leading an invesgaon of sea level variaons in the Disko Bay region of western Greenland.According to a statement from the company with over 40 years of experience in oceanographic, acoustic, remote sensing and ice research products and scientific consulting services, a shore-based system compares the direct arrival of GPS signals to the signals reflected off the sea surface to obtain sea level.The presence of sea ice and icebergs complicate the measurements. A shore-mounted camera provides information…

An American naval vessel went to the aid of a rubber boat that was sinking off the coast of Libya, rescuing 41 people and collecting 12 bodies, a humanitarian group said on Tuesday after its ship was contacted by radio to help out.The U.S. navy vessel Trenton called the German charity Sea Watch, which operates the only charity rescue ship currently on patrol off the Libyan coast, to alert them to the shipwreck and ask for assistance, a spokesman for Sea Watch said.The Dutch-flagged Sea Watch 3 ship was en route to rendezvous with the Trenton, said spokesman Ruben Neugebauer.

Nigerian migrants who survived a deadly sea crossing last year filed a lawsuit against Italy for violating their rights by supporting Libya’s efforts to return them to North Africa, their lawyers said on Tuesday.Seventeen plaintiffs petitioned the European Court of Human Rights last week, Violeta Moreno-Lax, a legal advisor for the Global Legal Action Network, told reporters. She was among four lawyers and several humanitarian groups involved in the case.The migrants say Italy violated multiple articles of the European Convention on Human Rights…

Three migrants died in the Mediterranean on Monday night, a German aid group said, during Italian-led rescue operations in which thousands more were pulled to safety from rickety boats. About 5,000 migrants were picked up off the Libyan coast by emergency services, Italy's navy, aid groups and private boats on Monday, and rescues were continuing on Tuesday, according to an Italian coastguard spokesman. "Despite all efforts, three people died from a sinking rubber boat" and rescue boats in the area are struggling to cope, German humanitarian group Jugend Rettet said on Facebook. Jugend Rettet (Rescuing Youth) is one of about nine aid…

More than 120 migrants are feared to have died at the weekend when the motor of their boat was stolen, causing it to sink, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said, citing testimony from survivors brought to Italy. Two Sudanese men who arrived with around 1,000 other migrants at the Sicilian port of Palermo on Monday told IOM staff they left Libya in a rubber boat packed with 130 people, mainly Sudanese, IOM spokesman Flavio Di Giacomo said. After a few hours at sea, the men said a group of Libyans caught them up. "They described (the Libyans) as pirates, but they are basically traffickers," Di Giacomo said. "They stole the motor - something which has happened a few times recently - and at that point the boat started to take on water and sank," he said.

Five migrants are believed to have died when a rubber boat sank off the coast of Libya on Tuesday, aid groups said on Friday, adding that reports earlier this week that many more had been killed were wrong. Probably still in shock after he was taken to the Italian island of Lampedusa, a 16-year-old Gambian boy told humanitarian workers on Wednesday he was the only survivor of the wreck, Cecile Pouilly, a spokeswoman for the UNHCR, told reporters. When 140 others disembarked at a different port on Thursday, several identified the boy as having been on the same boat. "So we have pretty good information that this tragedy didn't occur as was initially reported," said Joel Millman, spokesman for the International Organization for Migration.

Six migrants died and up to 100 more were missing and feared dead after their rubber boat sank in the Mediterranean on Thursday, the president of the Italian unit of aid group Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said. A British navy ship rescued 27 people and recovered six bodies about 20 miles from the coast of Libya early on Thursday morning, MSF Italy president Loris De Filippi said. The new disaster adds to a death toll which aid groups had put at 240 for the three days ending on Wednesday, as migrants continue to leave Libya despite rough seas. The migrants were transferred to the MSF ship Bourbon Argos, one of several aid agency vessels operating in the area. Survivors told staff that another 90 to 100 people had also been on board and had died.

About 550 migrants, most of them from West Africa, were pulled to safety from boats in the Mediterranean on Monday in five operations during which rescuers also recovered five dead bodies, Italy's coast guard said. The bodies were in a rubber dinghy and one other person from the dinghy had drowned, according to aid group SOS Mediterranee, whose Aquarius vessel helped in the rescues off Libya's coast. "We recovered five bodies dead inside the rubber boat after the rescue, and one person drowned," an SOS Mediterranee spokeswoman said, quoting two rescue workers who said they saw the person drowning. They were not able to recover the body. A boy, who was unconscious for two hours, and a woman who had inhaled a lot of fuel, were evacuated by helicopter.

Aid group Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said on Wednesday 25 migrant men and women were found dead at the bottom of a rubber boat in the Mediterranean, and 107 survivors were rescued from the same raft.   The bodies were discovered late on Tuesday, an MSF spokeswoman said.   MSF's Mediterranean rescue unit said on Twitter: "23 of the rescued people had horrific chemical burns, 7 were so severely injured that they needed to be evacuated to Italy, 2 by helicopter".   More than 3,500 people have died or disappeared trying to cross the Mediterranean from North Africa this year, the International Organization for Migration estimates.   Rescuers plucked 500 migrants from overcrowded boats to safety on Tuesday, Italy's coast guard said. (Reporting by Isla Binnie)

The European Union will go ahead with training for the Libyan coast guard this week, days after a coast guard vessel allegedly attacked a boat carrying migrants, causing four of them to drown. The German humanitarian group Sea-Watch recovered the four bodies after an attack on Friday that its members say was carried out by a vessel with the markings of the Libyan coast guard. "The aim was to start the training this week, and this week it will start," the spokesman for the EU's Operation Sophia, Antonello De Renzis Sonnino, told Reuters. The bodies of the four migrants reached Palermo, Sicily, on Monday aboard the Norwegian rescue vessel Siem Pilot, which carried 1,100 rescued migrants and 13 other bodies.

The crew of a speedboat labelled "Libyan Coast Guard" attacked a migrant boat packed with some 150 migrants, beating them with sticks and causing many to fall into the water and at least four to drown, humanitarian group Sea-Watch said on Friday. Rescuers recovered three more dead bodies on a different rubber boat and picked up a total 3,300 survivors from 24 different boats during the day, Italy's coast guard said. Germany-based Sea-Watch, one of several non-governmental organisations operating vessels off the coast of Libya, said the speedboat swooped in just as they were about to go to the aid of the overcrowded rubber boat in the early hours of Friday.

ROME, Oct 21 (Reuters) - An NGO rescue group said on Friday that the crew of a speedboat labelled "Libyan Coast Guard" had attacked a migrant boat packed with some 150 migrants, beating them with sticks and causing at least four to fall into the water and drown. "The violent intervention of the Libyan Coast Guard caused a situation of mass panic on board the rubber boat in distress," Sea Watch said in a statement. The Sea Watch crew were still conducting rescue operations, but had already recovered four bodies, Sea Watch spokesman Ruben Neugebauer told Reuters. A spokesman for Libya's naval forces in Tripoli said he had not heard about about the incident.

Rescuers pulled 301 boat migrants to safety and found five dead bodies in five operations in the central Mediterranean on Wednesday, the Italian Coast Guard said. An Irish navy ship recovered the five dead from a rubber boat along with 118 survivors. Humanitarian group Life Boat saved 130 people from another rubber boat. Overnight, Italian Coast Guard vessels rescued 18 people from a wooden boat near the southern island of Pantelleria, a further 11 near the uninhabited island of Lampione, and 24 more off the coast of Lampedusa Island on Wednesday morning. The central Mediterranean route between North Africa and Italy is the deadliest border in the world for migrants.

About 6,055 migrants were rescued on Monday as they tried to reach Europe on about 40 boats, one of the highest numbers in a single day, Italy's coast guard said. A statement said at least nine migrants had died and a pregnant woman and a child had been taken by helicopter to a hospital on the Italian island of Lampedusa, halfway between Sicily and the Libyan coast. One coast guard ship rescued about 725 migrants on a single rubber boat, one of some 20 rescue operations during the day. About 10 ships from the coast guard, the navy and humanitarian organisations were involved in the rescues, most of which took place some 30 miles off the coast of Libya. Monday was the third anniversary of the sinking of a migrant boat off Lampedusa in which 386 people died.

An Irish navy ship recovered 17 dead bodies on Thursday when it went to the aid of migrants packed onto a wooden boat off the coast of Libya, Italy's coastguard said, marking another deadly day of attempted sea crossings. The LE James Joyce, which is in the Mediterranean specifically to perform search-and-rescue operations, brought on board the bodies of 16 men and one boy, a coastguard spokesman said. He could provide no further details about the cause of death or the nationalities of the dead. On Wednesday, 22 bodies were recovered from a rubber boat off the Libyan coast, and some 3,000 are dead or missing after trying to reach the European Union by sea so far this year, the International Organization for Migration estimates.