Yesterday, Sunday, the crew of the surveillance aircraft Colibri witnessed once again a dramatic case of failure to render assistance by the Italian authorities. A rubber boat with over 80 refugees was in distress at sea for over 9 hours and was finally towed back to war-torn Libya by the country’s so-called Coast Guard. At…
Berlin, 04.07.2018 The political offensive against monitoring and rescue missions in the Mediterranean continues: Now the civil reconnaissance aircraft Moonbird was blocked from operations as well. The aircraft is operated by Sea-Watch and the Swiss Humanitarian Pilots Initiative (HPI) and is supported by the Protestant Church of Germany (EKD). The Maltese authorities do not allow…
In the last year alone, more than 3,000 people have drowned in the Central Mediterranean Sea; in 2018, more than 500 have lost their lives already. Without the reconnaissance aircraft “Moonbird”, deployed by Sea-Watch and the Swiss Humanitarian Pilots Initiative (HPI), there would have been 1000 more deaths in 2017 alone. Time and again the…
One Day with the Mission Moonbird written by Anja Franke On the evening before take-off, pilot Manos hands me an orange full-body suit. “So that one can find us if we crash over the sea”, he said and I tried to forget my fear of heights. Now the four of us are sitting in the…
On easter sunday, more than 100 Refugees were saved at the last minute from a sinking rubber boat off the coast of Libya, after being spotted by a reconnaissance aircraft far from any rescue ship. At least seven of the occupants had already drowned at this point in time. This describes the current record…
