Dozens missing, 9 dead in migrant boat wreck off Spanish Canaries

MADRID - Nine people are confirmed drowned and at least 48 are missing after a boat carrying migrants capsized off Spain's Canary Islands overnight, rescue services said Saturday, the latest in a series of such disasters off the west coast of Africa.

Sea rescue teams said in a statement they had answered a distress call off El Hierro, one of the islands in the Atlantic archipelago, shortly after midnight. They managed to save 27 people out of 84 on board.

Anselmo Pestana, head of the Canary Islands prefecture, said survivors had told their rescuers that the boat had set off from Nuadibu in Mauritania, some 800 kilometres away.

They also suggested that there might have been as many as 90 people on board. Four of those rescued were minors, he added.

Pestana was speaking from the port of La Estaca, on El Hierro island.

The most critical part of the operation was when the rescue vessels approached the boat in distress, he told journalists, because it was vital that those on board the stricken craft stay calm.

They had to follow the instructions of the rescue crews to ensure their vessel stayed balanced and did not capsize, he added.

But as the migrants had gone two days without food or water, that probably contributed to the panic and the boat capsizing, he said.

Five ships, three helicopters and one plane had taken part in the search and rescue operation, he added.