The private rescue organization Sea Eye is preparing two new vessels to run search and rescue missions in the Mediterranean Sea. Both ships will set sail from Spain under a German Flag.
The German organization Sea-Eye announced Thursday that one of the vessels, the sailing boat "Bavaria One", will serve patrolling purposes only while the second ship, the "Sea-Eye 2", has the capacity to take onboard migrants and bring them to a safe place.
"This way we want to be present and to inform the public about what is happening in the shadows of a deadly, isolationist EU-policy“, the NGO said in a statement. Rescue missions by private organizations have been stalled in recent months after the Italian government repeatedly refused the ships entry into Italian ports.
Sea-Eye Chairman Tilman Mischkowsky announced that the organization hopes to arrive off the Libyan coast in the first week of November.
Sea-Eye had been running missions with its vessels "Sea-Eye" and "Seefuchs" until June 2018 when the Netherlands renounced the ships‘ flags and registration. Since then, the missions had been on hold.
The acquisition of the new vessels was funded by private donations as well as the German Lutheran Church (EKD) and the Mennonite aid organization in Germany. Since Sea-Eye launched three years ago, the organization has rescued more than 14,000 people in the Mediterranean Sea, according to its website.