Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (EFE) that most of the survivors came ashore with hypothermia and nine of them ended up in hospital.
The boat was located around 3:40 a.m. some 37 kilometers east of Arrecife by the Salvamar Al Nair, which rescued the 43 people who were on board at the time: 32 men, 10 women and a small girl, according to a report Salvage spokesperson.
The situation that the Al Nair sailors found when they intercepted the boat was as follows, according to sources from the emergency services told EFE: the zódiac was flooded with more than ten centimeters of water inside and almost all of its occupants they showed symptoms of cold, some of them already very weak, like two men who were hugging each other.
One of them died without the Salvamento Marítimo crew being able to revive him and the other was evacuated in critical condition as soon as he disembarked at the Arrecife pier. In total, nine people were transferred to the Doctor José Molina Orosa Hospital, most with hypothermia and two of them in serious condition.
Once on land, the survivors have told medical assistance that not only the man whose body was recovered by the Salvamar still in the pneumatics died, but also seven more people who were thrown into the ocean as they died.
Among them, there could be at least one child, because one of the survivors was lamenting on the dock that she had slept the last night and that her son, who was with her, was not already on board when she woke up, before they rescue occurred.
The same sources have specified that the assistance has been very hard, due to the state of mind and weakness of the 42 people who arrived alive on land.
Temperatures have dropped significantly in the Canary Islands in the last week and on many islands there is an intense sensation of cold, which intensifies at sea due to the wind and humidity.
At the Lanzarote airport, the Aemet station on land closest to the rescue point, temperatures dropped this morning (2:00 am) to 12 degrees. The rescue occurred 37 kilometers from there, out to sea, an hour and a half later.
Caminando Fronteras, the NGO that usually transfers to the Spanish authorities the departure notices of boats provided by families, assures that it is not aware that there was currently a pneumatic boat with that number of occupants (43 people) at sea.
However, it is pending the appearance of several boats with 50 or more occupants that left the area of Tan Tan (Morocco) in recent days, a town at a navigation distance from Lanzarote compatible with the three days reported by the survivors (220 kilometers, in a straight line).
Some of the survivors have detailed that they left the province of Tarfaya, bordering the Guelmim region, where Tan-Tan is located. Depending on the point of departure within that province, the distance from the Moroccan coast to the closest point in Lanzarote ranges from 120 to 200 kilometers.
While this rescue was being completed, the Salvamar Macondo was helping a boat in the south of Gran Canaria with 64 people of sub-Saharan origin on board: 35 men, 24 women and five children.
According to the information provided by 112, three of the women, pregnant, were referred from Arguineguín to the Maternal and Child Hospital of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria.
16 boats in just over a week
In the eight days since February, the Canary Islands have received 16 boats with a total of 724 immigrants, most of them rescued in the waters of Lanzarote, according to data from the Government Delegation.
The arrivals of this first week of February bring to 1,290 people rescued on the Canary Route so far this year in 30 boats, figures much lower than those that were handled in 2022 on these same dates: 3,924 people in 86 boats.
The comparison between the two years shows a decrease of 67% in the number of immigrants arriving on the Canary coasts until February 8 (2,634 less) and 65% in the number of boats (56 less).
Most of the rescues are concentrated in Lanzarote, with 18 of the 30 rescue boats to date. EFE
