He Government of Morocco has officially requested this Friday help Spain to refloat his patrol boat, stranded in the waters of Melilla since more than 30 hours.
According to Europa Press, citing Melilla port sources, the regime of Mohamed VI has activated the operation to request the intervention of specialized means that could arrive from Cádiz, Almería and Cartagena (Murcia).
As a result, the Government Delegation announced around 6:00 p.m. that “due to the situation of the Moroccan patrol boat stranded on the South Dock, the National Maritime Rescue Plan has been activated to proceed to rescue it“.
Since this Thursday at around 10:30 a.m. the Moroccan military and police vessel ran aground next to the South Dam of Melilla, the work to try to recover the patrol boat was being carried out by the Royal Moroccan Navy y two tugboats arrived from the neighboring country, but the jobs have been until now fruitlessEuropa Press continues.
After 30 hours of the maritime incident, these port sources have stressed that the Moroccan authorities have requested Spanish collaboration given that the boat, named ‘El Kaced’has not only been recovered, but has even worsened his situation because part of the boat is sunken, specifically “the stern part.”
Before Morocco’s decision, the Port Authority of Melilla had already taken preventive measures in case a patrol boat spill and thereby avoid, should this occur, environmental damage to the Melilla coast.
The Port Authority has put a permanent guard with its police at the South Dam, in case a spill occurs, and at that same moment give notice so that its environmental office applies emergency measures in this type of case. In fact, the president of the public body himself, Manuel Ángel Quevedo, has been following the rescue work of the patrol boat and the consequences if this operation is not possible.
This incident occurred near the South Dam of Melilla, next to La Hípica beachlocated more than half a kilometer from Moroccan port of Beni-Enzar.
From that moment on, the port authorities are “on alert” in case the patrol boat finally ends up sinking and a spill occurs, in which case they activate the emergency measures established by the protocol for emergency situations of this type. They have asserted that the vessel “It has a leak in the hull and they spend all day with the bilge pump“to try to keep it from sinking.
According to these sources, the Moroccan patrol boat left Thursday morning of his base port in Nador when the engines shut down, apparently “due to a breakdown,” and the east wind pushed the boat against the submerged breakwater of the South Dike, in Melillaat which time it ran aground.
