At least 1,000 people died in the Mediterranean Sea attempting to reach the European shores in the past week, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
“The past eight days marks one of the deadliest periods yet in the migration crisis, which is now in its fourth year,” the organization stated on May 31.
Over 200,000 have been estimated to reach Italian borders by sea between Jan. 1 and May 29, often using unseaworthy barges in poor condition.
Over 2,400 have paid their lives for attempting the risky journey across the Mediterranean.
That’s significantly more than the 1,800 dead in the same period last year, though the number arrivals remained around the same as during this period last year.
The most deadly accident of the past week happened on May 26, when a wooden boat with over 550 on board started to take in water.
When a pump on board ran out of fuel, the migrants asked for more fuel from the captain of their tugboat. The tugboat itself carried about 800 migrants.
The captain refused to give them the fuel.
“At this point there was nothing left to do: the water was everywhere and we slowly started to sink,” said one of the survivors identified by IOM as Stefanos from Eritrea.
The captain of the tugboat cut the tug rope, leaving the wooden boat behind.
“There were between about 35 women and 40 children next to me: they all died,” said Stefanos, one of only 87 who survived.
Survivors told IOM they did’t want to take off in a boat without an engine, but were forced aboard by the smugglers.
Arrivals sharply increased in April and May this year, partly due to better weather and partly due to use of bigger wooden boats that can carry more people, said Federico Soda, Director of the IOM Coordination Office for the Mediterranean in Rome.
