El Hierro Takes In 1,235 as Canaries Log Record 1,488 in One Day

The Canary Islands received 1,488 migrants on Saturday, Nov. 14, the highest number ever recorded there in a single day, according to a provisional count by Spain’s EFE news agency. Most of them, 1,235 people, landed on El Hierro, an island with about 11,400 residents. The others were brought ashore on Gran Canaria and Tenerife.

The previous one-day record for the archipelago was 1,461, set in November 2020. EFE Canarias reported that rescue teams helped twelve cayucos (the long wooden boats used on the Atlantic route) off El Hierro in 24 hours, plus one off Gran Canaria and one off Tenerife.

Who arrived and where they came from

People who landed on El Hierro had been at sea for between four and seven days after setting out from Senegal, The Gambia or Mauritania, according to teams assisting them on arrival, Spain in English reported. One group of 240 people rescued on Saturday said they had spent six days crossing from Gunjur in The Gambia. That group included 36 minors.

On Gran Canaria, 17 people were taken to hospital after checks at the port of Arguineguín.

A small port and a stretched reception centre

La Restinga, in the south of El Hierro, is the main landing point for rescues near the island and also a working fishing harbour. Magaly González, deputy mayor of El Pinar, told the public broadcaster RNE last week that boats piling up in the harbour had left fishing crews little room to manoeuvre and were disrupting the island’s dive centres.

The temporary reception centre in San Andrés was reported to be holding 317 people before Saturday’s arrivals were counted. Another 11 people who came ashore earlier remained in hospital. On Saturday, 158 people were moved from El Hierro to Tenerife on a scheduled ferry.

What Madrid agreed after declaring an emergency

The record day came five days after the Spanish government declared a migration emergency in the Canaries. Ministers called urgent talks once 4,587 people had reached the islands in the first six days of November. Canary Islands president Fernando Clavijo and El Hierro island council president Alpidio Armas met territorial policy minister Ángel Víctor Torres and other ministers at La Moncloa, the prime minister’s office, on Tuesday, Nov. 10.

The government announced:

• An extra €15.18 million to add places at state-run reception centres and to pay for transfers between islands and to mainland Spain.
• A further €1 million for the Red Cross to strengthen medical care and immediate help for new arrivals.
• One more maritime rescue vessel.
• More staff to handle the relocation of unaccompanied minors.

Clavijo said the central government had also agreed to set up a compensation fund for La Restinga businesses hit by the situation, among them fishing operators, dive centres, restaurants and places to stay. La Moncloa’s own statement said the Treasury would study how to cover extraordinary costs borne by local authorities and that the Economy Ministry would track the effect on businesses. No timetable for compensation was given.

What this means for people in Spain

Part of the new money pays for transfers to mainland Spain, so some of the people arriving in the Canaries will be housed in state-run centres elsewhere in the country. The extra staff will process the relocation of unaccompanied minors. On El Hierro, rescue landings share one small harbour with the fishing boats and dive centres that local businesses rely on.

What happens next

Torres was scheduled to visit the port of La Restinga on Sunday, Nov. 15. The government has not said when the business compensation fund will open or how the Treasury will cover local authorities’ extra costs.

Source: Spain in English