The coast of Los Cocoteros has been stained with mourning this Sunday after the overturning of a small boat in which 28 people could be traveling, according to the testimony of one of the occupants. The intervention of two neighbors, who have thrown themselves into the water with surfboards, and agents of the Local Police has allowed the rescue of six people, but it is feared that up to 22 immigrants may have died in the incident, many of them young children.
The body of an eight-year-old girl was the first to be located, but the black chronicle increased shortly after, first when the lifeless body of a woman was located, then that of a man and, after 10:30 p.m., that of another woman. Meanwhile, another 18 people remained missing, although around 11 p.m. almost all the security and emergency bodies deployed in the area were withdrawn, with only some of the boats and a detachment remaining on land. The intention was to resume the entire device at 7 a.m. this Monday, with an aquatic search unit.
20 meters from the coast
The boat capsized at approximately 6:45 a.m. this Sunday when it was about 20 meters from the coast. In the midst of the screams and desperation of its occupants, a fight against time and against the sea began, the state of which complicated rescue tasks. Only six immigrants were found alive. Five of them were transferred to the Doctor José Molina Orosa Hospital with symptoms of hypothermia, anxiety and dehydration, and the sixth is under the custody of the Civil Guard.
This last immigrant is the only one who so far has been able to provide more data about this tragedy, which so far has left four corpses, but which could have claimed up to 22 lives. According to the testimony of this occupant of the boat, women (some of them could be pregnant) and several young children were traveling on board. In addition, his own brother is also among the missing.
Device
In addition to local police, Civil Guard, firefighters, the Emergency and Rescue Group and Maritime Rescue, the Red Cross and Emerlan, many political representatives were also present in the Los Cocoteros area. Among them, the Minister of Social Welfare of the Government of the Canary Islands, Inés Rojas, the president of the Cabildo, Manuela Armas, the mayors of Haría and Teguise, José Torres Stinga and José Dimas Martín, and the island director of the State Administration in Lanzarote, Carmelo García Déniz.
