ITALY: Rescue divers have pulled out 84 more bodies from the shipwrecked migrant boat off Lampedusa, bringing the total number of confirmed deaths to 195

Record ID: 348614

  • Title: ITALY: Rescue divers have pulled out 84 more bodies from the shipwrecked migrant boat off Lampedusa, bringing the total number of confirmed deaths to 195
  • Date: 6th October 2013
  • Summary: LAMPEDUSA, ITALY (OCTOBER 6, 2013) (REUTERS) RESCUE WORKERS ON PIER BEHIND VESSELS RESCUERS CARRYING BODY BAG RESCUE WORKERS ON PIER BEHIND VESSELS RESCUERS CARRYING ANOTHER BODY BAG COAST GUARD VESSEL PRIEST HANDING OUT NOTES TO RESCUE WORKERS (SOUNDBITE) (Italian) LAMPEDUSA RESIDENT, TOMMASO DI LUIGI, SAYING: "We feel very distressed. All you hear people talking about i
  • Embargoed: 21st October 2013 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Italy
  • Country: Italy
  • Topics: Disasters / Accidents / Natural catastrophes
  • Reuters ID: LVACS1V4PIJ4REFNNC718S5NOA1Q
  • Story Text: Divers searched rough waters off the coast of Sicily on Sunday (October 6) for the bodies of hundreds of migrants whose dream of escaping violence, poverty and oppression for a new life in Europe ended when their boat caught fire and sank.
    About 500 migrants were packed onto the boat, which capsized just a kilometre from their destination on Thursday (October 3), according to survivors. The Italian authorities say 195 bodies have been recovered and more than a hundred are still missing.
    The coastguard said 84 corpses had been brought to the surface on Sunday, despite 28-mile-per-hour gusts of wind and a metre-high swell. Authorities searched for bodies in and around the sunken boat, which was carrying mainly Eritreans and Somalis.
    Though the tiny southern Italian island takes in thousands of immigrants every year and there have been similar wrecks in the past, residents have been shaken by the sheer size of the tragedy.

    "We feel very distressed. All you hear people talking about is death, death, and then there are also children, it is a tragedy. It is an endless tragedy," said local man Tommaso di Luigi.

    "Usually it's not this bad with seven, eight deaths at most. I've never experienced anything of such a huge scale," he added.
    At the height of the migrant influx in 2011, when over 62,000 arrived in Italy, dozens of boats carrying hundreds and even thousands of people were arriving in Lampedusa every day.
    Although the numbers have declined, arrivals have continued, leading to a renewed debate in Europe over the wisdom of pouring money into extra sea patrols, radar systems and holding centres.
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