Wooden vessel carrying roughly 60 people overturned near El-Bardaa Island, marking third fatal Tobruk-area incident since June
At least 50 migrants, including women and children, are feared dead after their wooden boat capsized early Tuesday off the eastern coast of Libya, according to two Libyan security sources who spoke to Reuters. The boat had been carrying approximately 60 migrants from Sub-Saharan African countries when it went down near El-Bardaa Island, roughly 70 km (43 miles) west of Tobruk.
Ten survivors were pulled from the water and transported to a local hospital for treatment, the sources said. Survivors reported the boat departed early Tuesday morning before capsizing. The cause of the capsizing has not been disclosed.
What remains unconfirmed
As of Wednesday, more than 24 hours after the capsizing, no official statement has been issued by Libyan government authorities. No statement has come from UNHCR. No statement has come from the International Organization for Migration. It remains unclear whether an active search-and-rescue operation has been launched for the roughly 50 missing.
Separately, rescue teams in Tobruk on Monday recovered four migrant bodies and rescued 24 survivors from a different vessel that had been adrift in Libyan waters for roughly two weeks. That boat had carried 28 migrants; the four fatalities were attributed to the vessel's dilapidated condition and prolonged exposure at sea. In June, authorities in Tobruk recovered approximately 26 migrant bodies near the city after another boat capsized, from a vessel that reportedly carried 28 people with only four confirmed survivors.
The three incidents combined account for a combined toll of approximately 80 confirmed and feared dead in the Tobruk area over the past month. The April 5 capsizing that left 71 feared dead in the Central Mediterranean followed the same reporting pattern: NGO or security-source accounts, no state confirmation. The IOM's Missing Migrants Project has documented more than 80,000 deaths and disappearances along migration routes since 2014, though specific figures for the Central Mediterranean in 2026 have not been confirmed. Confirmation of Tuesday's deaths would add to this ongoing toll.
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Confirmation of the death toll, details on the vessel's departure point, and any search-and-rescue deployment remain outstanding.
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