Miracle at sea

Dramatic rescue of woman who gave birth in a dinghy

Sam Jones

The call that would lead to one of the most poignant images of the humanitarian emergency in the deadly waters off the Canary Islands came at 4am. In the early hours of 6 January, the Las Palmas command centre of Spain’s maritime rescue service, Salvamento Marítimo, told Domingo Trujillo, the captain of the search-and-rescue vessel Talía, that a small inflatable boat, packed with people, was adrift 180km off the coast of Lanzarote. Among those onboard, they added, was a woman who was due to give birth at any moment. As soon as the alert was received, the 32-metre-long Talía and its crew of eight left the Lanzarote port of Arrecife, bound for the drifting boat. When they arrived, five hours later, Trujillo and his colleagues found the small inflatable packed…

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Guardian Weekly (Digital) - 1 Issue, 17 January 2025

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