The 2013 Lampedusa Shipwrecks
In October 2013, two shipwrecks off the coast of Lampedusa killed more than 600 people. The disasters triggered a wave of political mourning across Europe and revealed, for the first time in sharp relief, the deadly gap between rhetoric and response.
On 3 October, a boat carrying migrants from Eritrea, Somalia and Ghana sank within sight of Lampedusa. 368 people died.
On 11 October, a second boat, carrying mostly Syrian refugees, among them 60 children, capsized after hours of unanswered distress calls. 268 died.
What made the second shipwreck particularly damning was what happened on board the Italian Navy vessel Libra, stationed nearby: its commander, according to communications logs later obtained by investigators, received an order to move the ship away from the migrants' boat – to effectively hide from it. The boat drifted for five hours before capsizing, within miles of a vessel that could have intervened. An Italian court later found the coastguard and navy guilty of manslaughter and negligence.
Sources & Further Reading
- WatchTheMed, first documentation of the 11 October shipwreck, including the delays caused by the dispute over responsibility between the Italian and Maltese coast guards.
- Forensic Oceanography / Forensic Architecture: "Death by Rescue", documents both October 2013 shipwrecks in the context of the termination of Mare Nostrum and the systematic refusal to rescue.
- Statewatch, 2021: "Italy let more than 200 people die in 2013 shipwreck, finds UN Human Rights Committee"
- Liberties.eu: "Italian Navy Under Investigation for Failure to Act"
- Al Jazeera, 2023: "Syrians long for justice 10 years after shipwreck"
- Amnesty International, 2023: "Ten years since the Lampedusa shipwreck, what lessons have been learned?"