August 18, Madrid (RAS/Xinhua). A boat was found in an accident near the Canary Islands of Spain on Thursday, according to the Spanish Maritime Safety Guard.
A boat carrying 128 people from Gambia was lost at sea for almost four weeks and it was found on Thursday south of the Canary Islands in Spain. According to the Spanish news agency (EFE), more than 80 migrants on the boat are suspected to be dead.
The boat was spotted on Wednesday afternoon about 120 kilometers south of Gran Canaria by an officer of a Spanish maritime rescue vessel. When the ship sent for rescue reached the crashed boat in "Gardamar Urania" around midnight, 45 people were found alive and five bodies were found there.
The survivors have been taken to the port of Arguineguin in Gran Canaria. It is said that rescuers could not pick up five bodies due to bad sea conditions and left them in the migrant boat.
The Spanish Civil Guard told the Spanish NGO Caminando Fronteras, "The markings inside the boat are consistent with the boat that left The Gambia on August 7 with 128 passengers, including four women and an infant."
In a report released in June, Cominando Fronteras said that a total of 1,317 migrants died trying to reach Spain in the first five months of 2026. Of those, 635 died on the Atlantic route to the Canary Islands, which the organization called the deadliest route to Spain during that period.
