In this blog series running throughout December, we have pulled together four photo stories that reflect different aspects of our search and rescue missions. For this story, we have collected images of migrant vessels that are left eerily empty once our SAR crews have pulled their passengers to safety.
A rubber dingy which had been carrying around 150 people slowly deflates post-rescue. In that day of operations alone, the Phoenix crew rescued and assisted 427 people from similar vessels.
A MOAS able seaman makes final checks on board a small wooden boat that carried 28 Bangladeshis. Having originally travelled to Libya with work visas, they had been trapped in the country since the outbreak of its civil war.
This wooden boat had carried an incredible 341 people, who were pressed together on deck and in the hold.
Children’s Disney floats – designed for much happier occasions- lie abandoned among other belongings discarded during a rescue operation. They are intended as a last line of defence between the children and the ocean by desperate parents on board.
118 people were pulled to safety from this leaking fishing vessel, designed to carry 3 or 4 people.
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