Army to look into 'botched' sea rescue operation

The army will be analysing a sea rescue operation described by one of the four men who survived it as "careless".

"We often analyse rescue missions as a matter of procedure but in this case we want to meet the survivors to see what they have to say about it," AFM commander Brigadier Carmel Vassallo told The Times.

One of the survivors, Mark Busuttil, told The Times on Monday that the AFM had basically "abandoned" them at sea, despite the fact that a distress message had been launched minutes before their eight-metre-long boat sank at about 1.30 a.m. on Saturday.

The 30-year-old was out at sea, some 16 miles north-west of Gozo, fishing with another three friends when the engine of their boat stalled and the vessel started taking in water. Before they knew it the boat was flooded and sinking.

They made it onto a small life raft and came across a patrol boat shortly after their boat sank but they were not spotted in the dark even though the search probably missed them only by a few metres at one point. Uplifted by the fact that the AFM seemed to have managed to locate the area they were in they assumed that a rescue operation would be launched at dawn, but it was not. Luckily for the four friends, huddled on a four-foot rubber dinghy, a fishing vessel towing a tuna pen was in sight. They spent the night rowing towards it and succeeding in catching up with the boat that was sailing at a snail's pace.

Mr Busuttil also complained that no signal appeared to have been sent out to nearby ships to keep an eye out for survivors but on this point the army said that their Rescue Coordination Centre (RCC) had broadcast what is known as a Pan Pan alert message about the incident in English and Maltese.

The Vessel Traffic Service system of the RCC identified a tug boat located just five miles south of the coordinates where the boat was last situated but the vessel's captain pointed out that the tug was towing tuna pens at very slow speed and manoeuvrability was very difficult.

Mr Busuttil said the captain of the tug boat that had brought them to safety, the Amantea, had told them that he had received no alert and Mr Busuttil suspects that the boat referred to by the army was farther away from them than the one which rescued them.

"Most of all, however," he said in reference to the AFM's explanations, "we don't want our pound of flesh but simply an acknowledgement that there were some shortcomings and that they will not take place again."

When contacted about this, Brigadier Vassallo said he had been in touch with one of the survivors and that he would be getting in touch with Mr Busuttil to assess the situation that developed.

"As happens in the case of most search and rescue operations, the AFM will see if there are lessons to be learned from this incident," he said.