This list of migrant vessel incidents on the Mediterranean Sea includes those resulting from the european border policies and the construction of the Fortress Europe with migration flows linked to developments such as the Arab Spring protests (2010–2012), the civil wars in Syria (since 2011) and Libya (2014–2020), and emerging conflicts in Sudan, Niger, Israel, and Palestine in 2023.
Over 28,000 people have died or have been declared missing while in migration across the Mediterranean Sea since 2014. The 'Deaths at the Border' project at the University of Amsterdam estimates that a further 3,188 people died while trying to reach Europe between 1990 and 2013.
By comparison, a total of 609 people lost their lives in maritime accidents between 2011 and 2021 which involved vessels registered by European Union countries or other registered vessels in EU waters.
This marked the beginning of what the media and politicians have termed the ‘migration crisis’. Following the exodus of millions of Syrians in 2015, European governments adopted a new border management strategy. The term ‘migration crisis’, which emerged at the same time, should, however, be viewed with caution, as it implies that the so-called ‘irregular’ arrivals of people at Europe’s borders are an unprecedented and unpredictable phenomenon. Yet the shift in European migration policies in the 1970s, brought about by the Schengen Agreements, made it possible to anticipate this ‘migration crisis’. Thus, Ruben Andersson highlights this paradox of European states which, in seeking to combat immigration, actually produce the very thing they hope to reduce: forms of illegal migration. This is why Annalisa Lendaro, amongst others, prefers to speak of a ‘reception crisis’, or even a ‘crisis of solidarity’ and of states’ capacity to respond.
Routes and context
Mediterranean routes
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has identified three key routes through which migrants in the region travel into Europe by sea or, in some cases, in journeys along coasts:
- the Central Mediterranean route from North Africa (mainly Libya and Tunisia) to Italy and, to a lesser degree, Malta;
- the Western Mediterranean route from Morocco and Algeria to Spain (including Ceuta and Melila);
- the Eastern Mediterranean route from Turkey to Greece and, to a lesser degree, Cyprus and Bulgaria.
Journeys before these crossings also carry a high risk for the people involved as they include crossing remote and harsh terrains, such as the Sahara Desert, and residing in countries in conflict such as Libya and Syria, where civil wars with international intervention have led to considerable forced migration since the Arab Spring.
Economic differences between the countries on the shores of the Mediterranean also contribute to economic migration to Europe as people seek higher wages and a better quality of life for themselves and their families. IMF data for 2023 provides the following ranking in gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP), in countries on major routes:
- Malta – $61,939
- Cyprus – $54,611
- Italy – $54,216
- Spain – $49,448
- Libya – $24,599
- Algeria – $13,507
- Tunisia – $13,270
- Morocco – $10,460
GDP per capita in Turkey ($41,412) and Greece ($39,478) is comparable, although the Aegean Sea is a transit route for migrants from elsewhere. Southern Italy and Andalusia are, by this measure, similar to North Africa ($17,000-18,000) although the Schengen zone allows for further northward migration.
Countries beyond immediate countries of origin experience considerable conflict and widespread poverty (and, increasingly, climate change) within a relatively short journey time to Europe. Some of the world's lowest living standards are experienced in Syria ($6,374 per capita GDP at pre-war levels), Sudan ($4,471) and Niger (£1,600).
Wider context
Migration routes via the Middle East from the Horn of Africa to Yemen, and routes through the Atlantic departing from the west coast of Africa, have also seen many fatalities.
1990–2015
During the Cold War, migration by land or sea in the region was limited (or highly regulated) by the presence of authoritarian regimes but also facilitated by relatively generous safe and legal immigration routes into Western Europe. In the years from 1990 onwards, migration across the Mediterranean Sea and Adriatic Sea increased for both economic reasons (with people travelling from developing countries in Africa and Asia) and as a result of conflict.
For example, several
conflicts in Africa, the Yugoslav Wars (1991–2001), the Algerian Civil War (1991–2002), and the 1997 civil unrest in Albania prompted several million people to leave or consider leaving their home countries as refugees. The events of the Arab Spring had a similar effect early in the second decade of the 21st century, especially as a result of wars in Syria and Libya.
The loss of European ships, such as the Costa Concordia in 2012, received substantially more public and media attention than that of migrant vessels during this time.
Pope Francis, however, highlighted the plight of migrants in 2013 when he visited Lampedusa, a southern Italian island which frequently serves as a reception centre for migrants. He remarked: "These brothers and sisters of ours were trying to escape difficult situations to find some serenity and peace; they were looking for a better place for themselves and their families, but instead they found death. How often do such people fail to find understanding, fail to find acceptance, fail to find solidarity. And their cry rises up to God."
2014 was a turning point in terms of scale of migrants dying or going missing during crossing attempts, although that does not diminish the sense of loss experienced by families and in home communities in previous times. In that year, 3,538 people died or went missing at sea according to UNHCR statistics; 3,289 dead or missing persons were recorded by the IOM's Missing Migrants Project. In trends repeated year on year from then onwards, most loss of life occurred in the Central Mediterranean area between Italy, Libya, Malta and Tunisia (but not exclusively) and mainly due to drowning (although with other accidents and causes also present).
Around 500 people died during the 2014 Malta migrant shipwreck on 11 September 2014. The eleven survivors included Doaa Al Zamel, whose story is featured in the 2017 book, A Hope More Powerful than the Sea.
2015
The year 2015 became the most significant in the crisis until that time, in terms of people dying or missing while migrating across the Mediterranean Sea, accompanied by a major increase in international public and media attention. A total of 3,771 deaths or incidents of individual missing persons were recorded by the UNHCR – 2,216 missing and 1,555 found dead.
The Central Mediterranean accounted for the majority of casualties – 2,911 people – followed by 793 in the Eastern Mediterranean and 67 in the Western Mediterranean.
The IOM estimates that the total number of dead and missing people was higher, at 4,055 persons, although in similar locations by route – 3,149 in the Central region, 804 in the Eastern region, and 102 in the Western region – and 3,737 by drowning and 113 through related accidents.
April
On 13 April 2015, a vessel sank off the Libyan coast with up to 550 migrants on board. More than 400 people are believed to have drowned. 144–150 people were rescued and were taken to a hospital in Southern Italy. The capsizing occurred 60 nautical miles (110 km) off the Libyan coast.
Air and sea search operations started in the location of the shipwreck, looking for survivors. Nine bodies were recovered; the Italian Coast Guard stated that "no more survivors have been found".
On 16 April, four immigrants arriving in Sicily said they were the only survivors of a sunken ship. They said that 41 people had drowned when their vessel overturned and sank shortly after departing from Libya. In an unrelated incident, 15 people were arrested in Sicily following reports that they had thrown 12 other passengers overboard, causing them to drown. According to eyewitnesses, a fight had broken out between Christian and Muslim groups on a boat that left Libya on 14 April, resulting in 12 Christians being thrown overboard.
On Saturday, 18 April, a boat that had just left the port city of Zuwarah, Tripoli, capsized off the Libyan coast during the night, with up to 850 migrants aboard. 28 people were rescued. The incident happened 60 miles (97 km) off the Libyan coast and 120 miles (190 km) south of the southern Italian island, Lampedusa. The boat may have capsized when people on board moved to one side when a ship approached. Italian prosecutors say that a Bangladeshi survivor estimated 950 people were on board, and smugglers locked hundreds of the migrants in the ship's hold. Among the people on board were about 350 Eritreans, 200 Senegalese, as well as migrants from Syria, Somalia, Sierra Leone, Mali, Gambia, Ivory Coast and Ethiopia. The Maltese Navy and Italian Coast Guard began mounting a rescue operation. Despite 18 ships joining the rescue effort, only 28 survivors and 24 bodies were pulled from the water by nightfall. This incident is cited by some as the shipwreck with the highest death toll in the history of the Mediterranean. In June 2016, Italian Navy conducted a recovery operation and raised the boat from a depth of 370 metres (1,214 ft) by a specially designed robotic apparatus. The wreck was brought to a port in Sicily by the MPSV Levoli Ivory and was kept in a refrigerated transport structure. Over the course of twelve days, Italian fire officers recovered human remains. Among other incidents, however, the sinking of the SS Oria in 1944, with a death toll of over 4,000, claimed more lives.
On 21 April Italian officials reported that the Tunisian captain of the boat had been charged with reckless multiple homicide. It was also reported that the children on board had drowned because they were trapped on the boat's lower two levels.
The Italian Navy, at the request of the Prosecutor of Catania, has made available the minesweepers Gaeta and Vieste, along with the corvette Sfinge, for search and localization of the vessel sank.
On 7 May 2015 a wreck with a length of 25 metres was located approximately 85 miles north east of the Libyan coast at a depth of 375 metres. The Italian Navy said it was correlated with the wreck of the vessel sank on 18 April.
A boat carrying migrants reportedly sank off the east coast of Rhodes, Greece on 20 April, after striking a reef. Initial reports suggested that there had been at least three deaths. 93 people were rescued from the water, with 30 individuals hospitalized. In contrast to the other wrecked ships, which have come from Libya, this boat had departed from Turkey.
Two further reports of ships in distress in the waters between Libya and Italy appeared on 20 April. It was stated that one boat contained up to 150 people, with the other containing up to 300. The precise locations of these boats was not revealed, and it was unclear whether these reports refer to separate vessels. The Italian and Maltese navies are reported as having responded to these calls. On Tuesday 21 April it was reported that all 450 passengers had been rescued, despite initial reports of deaths.
May
Rescue operations and landings of migrants continued on the coasts of Sicily and Calabria. The ship Phoenix arrived in Pozzallo carrying 369 migrants. Another 675 people landed in Augusta and 300 were rescued off the coast of Calabria. A container ship Zeran arrived in Catania with 197 people; there were five dead bodies. According to Save the Children 40 other immigrants lost their lives at sea.
In Crotone the Panamanian tanker Prince I brought 250 migrants rescued from the Channel of Sicily; the bodies of three others, two women and a man, were recovered at sea during a rescue.
Meanwhile, there was also alarm over diseases: about 150 of the 675 migrants who arrived on the Italian navy ship Vega in Augusta were put in isolation in the port for suspected cases of chickenpox and scabies. Under these conditions doctors considered there is no danger of further contagion. Most patients arriving were debilitated before the voyage by a wait of two months in warehouses in Libya with little food and water.
In Trapani, 104 immigrants arrived on a cargo ship; another 483 arrived in Palermo on the Italian Navy ship Borsini. This also led to a growth of the number of smugglers arrested by the Italian police forces.
Off the coast of Calabria, a rescue operation rescued about 300 migrants aboard a fishing vessel with poor buoyancy about 80 miles from the coast of Calabria.
The Italian Navy rescued 217 migrants and recovered 17 migrants who were aboard boats adrift in the channel of Sicily on 29 May 2015. 3,300 more migrants were rescued in the following 24 hours.
July
283 migrants aboard three boats were rescued by the German warship Schleswig-Holstein a few miles from the Libyan coast and landed in the port of Augusta in Sicily. 40 people were missing or dead according to the testimonies of survivors.
August
On 19 August, 49 migrants were killed by fumes while packed into the ship’s hold and prevented from exiting the hold by the ship's crew off the coast of Libya. Survivors were rescued by the Italian Navy and the ship's captain and crew were arrested.
Six migrants drowned off the coast of Turkey attempting to reach a Greek island.
On 26 August 50 migrants were killed by fumes while packed into the hold and prevented from exiting by the ship's crew off the coast of Libya; another 439 migrants on board were rescued by a Swedish unit.
September
A further 96 confirmed deaths were recorded in September 2015.