Georgian seafarers saved 52 lives in the open sea.

The Maritime Transport Agency contacted the searafarers on board.

"On july 10 we were healing in Morocco. Around 6 PM we saw an inflatable boat"...

In the 5-point storm in the Atlantic Ocena, 52 people on the raft, including 7 women and 3 childre, were left withour water or food.

"We Waited for rescuers for more than 10 hours to no avail. Our ship was circling the raft in order not to loose it in the opean sea. The weater got worse. Finally, this ship's crev decided to take the migrants out of the raft and on board. we started the rescue operation. We adjusted the raft to the ship and started to take people out".

Nine Georgian seafarers directly participated in the rescue mission of migrants: ?????? ???????, ????? ??????, ????? ??????????, ???? ???????????, ????? ?????????, ?????? ??????????, ?????? ????????, ???????? ????????? ??? ?????? ??????????.

These seafarers saved 52 people thanks to their exceptional courage, bravery and professionalism in the open sea!

Next year, Georgia will present them for the International Maritime Organization (IMO) award "for exceptional bravery at sea".

This award was given to Archimandrite Ilia Cartozia for the first time in 2015 after his death (Archimandrite Ilia Cartozia died on December 28, 2014, as a result of an accident during a fire on the Italian ferry "Norman Atlantic". At the time of the fire on the ship, 487 passengers were on board, including 8 citizens of Georgia and there were 12 crew members. Father Ilia was traveling to Bari, Italy, to the tomb of St. Nicholas. During the accident, when rescuers were transferring people from a burning ship to a lifeboat, he gave his place up to a lady with a child and remained on deck. Unfortunately, the rescuers could not save Father Ilia) and in 2018 the award was given to Captain Levan Mamaladze and his crew, who saved 13 people