Who do you call in the Mediterranean?

. Mid Mediterranean map

From Pulse by Antonio Martorell Dominguez

The question nobody could answer

It started in the Indian Ocean.

In every maritime security meeting I attended during my time with EUNAVFOR, with shipping companies on one side of the table and navies, agencies and rescue centers on the other, the same question came up: if something happens to one of our ships in this area, who exactly do we call?

Nobody was quite sure, and the answers did not agree.

The network already existed.

Most people in the room knew the centers, the agencies and the operations.

What nobody had was their details in one place: the numbers were scattered across documents and websites, hard to find, and sometimes out of date.

So we put order on it, for that ocean first: we identified every stakeholder, established who does what, checked one way to reach each of them, and put all of it on one map where anyone could find it in seconds.

Then we saw the same thing in every sea we looked at: the same question, the same scattered and outdated numbers, and nowhere more than in the Mediterranean, with more agencies than any sea we knew.

Then we saw that the Indian Ocean was no exception.

The same question, and the same scattered and outdated numbers, came up in every sea we looked at, and nowhere more than in the Mediterranean, with more agencies than any sea we knew.

So we kept going, and this time we built a team for it: David Parla Duque on the design and the platform, Hector Salvador, who had worked on the Indian Ocean map with us, and Caroline Abu Sa'da with the Foundation for Humanitarian Action at Sea (FHAS), who opened the rescue center network to us.

Where it started

The first map was the Western Indian Ocean Maritime Emergency Contact Map.

David Parla Duque and I built it together, under the organizations we each worked for at the time; it was published on the MSCIO website and sponsored by MSCIO.

One map: every rescue center, every reporting center with the primary one marked, the regional fusion centers, the naval presence and its areas, with a checked number for each.

The problem was bigger than one operation or one ocean, so we decided to go further: map every sea, one region at a time, as an independent effort.

That decision is the Abyssal Initiative.

The Indian Ocean map came with it, and the Mediterranean was the first map built under its name.

Where it started: the Western Indian Ocean Maritime Emergency Contact Map, Edition 1, July 2025.
The Mediterranean, with FHAS

The Mediterranean took about a year and three maps, Western, Mid and Eastern, from Gibraltar to the Black Sea.

We built it with Foundation for Humanitarian Action at Sea, whose co-founder and director, Caroline Abu Sa'da, brought the rescue center network and current contacts we could not have reached alone.

The maps carry:

• Every rescue center, with its phone number, its email, and the languages its staff speak, so you know before you dial.
• The international contacts in their own box: NATO Shipping Centre, UKMTO and Frontex on every map, plus EUNAVFOR MED IRINI and the Italian and Maltese coast guards on the Mid map.
• Civil organizations that can pass on a distress call when no official line answers.
• The area of every naval and agency operation, drawn on the map: EUNAVFOR MED IRINI, Mediterraneo Sicuro, NATO Noble Shield and Sea Guardian, and the Frontex operations.

 

The Eastern Mediterranean map

Put it in the hands of an officer of the watch with a security incident developing.

The officer sees which rescue region the ship is in and the center that owns it, which operation areas the ship is inside, and the reporting centers on their own lines.

Do the numbers work?

We did our best to make sure they do.

Together with FHAS, we checked every contact against official sources and then with the center itself: a call to confirm the number, the email and the languages.

Even so, the maps will have mistakes. Numbers change, people move, and a line that was right in September may be wrong by December.

That is why the network matters more than the paper: the people who use the maps are the ones who will keep them right.

If you see an error, tell us, and we will check it with the center and fix it.

The map goes digital

We wanted the maps to be easy to use, so we built a digital version as well: the Abyssal SAR Map.

It is free, and it does more than paper can.

Both regions sit on one globe.

You can filter by rescue regions, centers or operations, search for a center by name, click on it to get the number and the languages, and switch on the operations layer to see every area drawn.

We still recommend printing the maps and keeping them on the bridge.

Connections at sea are not always good, and the day you need a number may be the day the screen is blank.

The digital map is for everyone else, and for the bridge when the connection holds.

This is not only for seafarers.

Anyone who works in maritime safety, security or shipping, ashore or at sea, can use it alongside the tools they already have.

On every screen there is a button to report a correction.

The platform is the work of David Parla Duque and his team, and it shows.

They keep improving it, and the website with it, so what you see today will be better next month.

 

The Abyssal SAR Map: both regions on one globe.

Example: Tunis MRCC, with its contact details

Example of the operations layer: Frontex Themis drawn on the map, with its contact at the top of the screen.

Example of the operations layer: Frontex Themis drawn on the map, with its contact at the top of the screen.

Who keeps it current

People do. The Foundation for Humanitarian Action at Sea, the Maritime Search and Rescue Council, the NATO Shipping Centre, EUCRIMARIO are part of this network.

Each of them does a great deal for the wellbeing of seafarers.

Since the launch, rescue coordination centers and people with deep local knowledge have written to us on their own to correct a line or add one.

So this is a thank you.

To Caroline and the FHAS, to the partners, to the centers that picked up the phone, and to everyone who has written in with a correction or feedback.

This is a joint effort, the result belongs to all of us, and it is for everyone working to make the sea safer.

The network is what makes the maps worth printing.

Next: the Pacific

Next is the Pacific, and Latin America follows.

We will report the whole process, step by step, on the Abyssal Initiative page as the map is built, so anyone who wants to follow it or contribute can do so from the first draft.

Thank you to everyone who is contributing and to everyone who wants to be part of this network.

No vessel sails alone.