On 28 October 2015, a migrant boat left the coast of Western Turkey heading to the closest European coast—the Greek island of Lesvos. The sea was rough, and the boat was old and overcrowded with more than 300 passengers. It sank 280m beyond the maritime border into Greece, in EU territorial waters, resulting in the death of at least 43 people. It was the deadliest incident in a period known as the ‘long summer of migration’, when over a million refugees and migrants attempted to reach EU shores by sea.

The incident was widely reported in international media. That reporting credited Frontex, the EU’s border agency, and the Greek coastguard, as having carried out of a successful and competent rescue operation. Our analysis disputes this, however, and opens up possibilities for civil society groups to call for accountability for lives lost in the Mediterranean.

One of the survivors, the artist Amel Alzakout recorded the journey and the shipwreck on a waterproof camera attached to her wrist. This footage provides a unique situated perspective of this tragic event at the threshold of Europe.

A helicopter hovers above the site of the shipwreck. (Image: Amel Alzakout)

In collaboration with Alzakout, Forensic Architecture reconstructed the boat’s journey, the shipwreck, and the rescue operation that followed.

Cross-referencing Alzakout’s footage with other sources, including videos filmed by activists, press and the Greek coastguard, long range thermal footage filmed by artist Richard Mosse, as well as weather data, we examined how the event unfolded, as well as the actions and interactions of those involved: smugglers, migrants, rescuers, coastguard, Frontex agents, activists, fishermen, and NGOs.

We demonstrated how the EU’s long-term policy of policing and repelling migrants along its maritime borders left those agencies, and local coastguards, underprepared and under-equipped for rescue operations.

A few days before the shipwreck, European and Turkish authorities published a joint action plan to restrict migration across Europe’s eastern borders. The prospect of a closed border could explain why the smugglers overpacked the old wooden boat and sent it out into rough seas.

In March 2016, four-and-a-half months after the shipwreck, the EU-Turkey deal came into effect. Since then, Aegean waters have been further militarised, with dramatic increases in surveillance and interceptions. EU agencies continue to treat those attempting to reach European shores as intruders, rather than as civilians seeking safe haven.

This case also reveals the crucial role of civil society actors, such as the NGO Proactiva and private fishing vessels, in the rescue. Since then, NGOs responsible for saving thousands of lives in the Mediterranean have been obstructed and criminalised by EU states, as part of the EU policies of closing the borders.

Alzakout’s footage also forms the basis of Purple Sea, her film with Khaled Abdulwahed and Pong Films.