Specifically, six children and two mothers are being treated for preventive reasons at the Larnaca General Hospital. The other eight adults out of the 16 who were transported around 00.30 this morning to Larnaca Hospital, after receiving First Aid, were escorted by the Police to a hotel in the city for overnight.
The 16 people were transported by helicopter from Protaras to Larnaca airport and from there by ambulance, and accompanied by the Police were taken to the General Hospital of the city.
A total of six children and a woman are being treated at the Famagusta General Hospital, while a man was taken to a hotel for the night.
A child was transported by ambulance last night from the General Hospital of Famagusta to the Makareio Hospital, in Nicosia, after, as it was found, he suffered from hypothermia and dehydration.
It is recalled that around eight last night at the Search and Rescue Coordination Center, a distress signal was received from a boat located six nautical miles east of Protaras, off Cape Greco. The ship was carrying 26 people, most of them women and children from Lebanon.
Police and National Guard vessels rushed to the scene, literally battling the stormy sea and strong winds blowing in the area, to rescue the shipwrecked who fell into the sea when their boat began to sink.
The rescue operation involved units of the Port Police and the Navy of the National Guard as well as the Air Wing of the Police and the Air Force of the National Guard.
From the first moment, the Minister of Defense, Christoforos Fokaidis, went from Nicosia to the offices of the Search and Rescue Coordination Center in Larnaca and closely monitored all the actions taken for the shipwreck rescue operation.
In his statements, Mr. Fokaidis stated that "all the forces of the Republic have been mobilized and under the coordination of the Search and Rescue Coordination Center, they carried out a very difficult operation under extremely adverse weather conditions."
He added that "a torpedo boat of the UNIFIL naval force, which is patrolling the area to determine if there is any shipwreck at sea" was called.
According to the shipwrecked, they had originally started from Lebanon to Greece, however, in the middle of the journey, their trafficker boarded another boat and escaped, leaving the 26 people on the boat to fight the raging waves.
According to the survivors, most of whom are from the Lebanese city of Tartu, the adults paid the trafficker $ 2 each to transport them from Lebanon to Greece and the children $ XNUMX each.
Source: KYPE