Moroccan Man’s Wife and Son Perish in Tragic Mediterranean Crossing Attempt

After several days, Sadik learned that his wife and son were traveling on a boat that capsized on October 14 off Cadiz. "I traveled in 2019 and I almost died," recalls the 34-year-old Moroccan, aware that his wife and son "were dead." "My son died in his mother’s arms. I can’t even imagine the pain of that moment. A mother seeing her son die before her eyes. They were everything to me," he confides to El País.

The 28 occupants of the boat, mostly from Fez, paid 3,000 euros for this sea voyage that began on Tuesday, October 12, says Sadik, adding that the boat’s engine broke down after two days of navigation, just a few hours from the Spanish coast. "... The waves overturned the boat," explains the now widowed man. Chaimae and Mohamed were wearing life jackets, which allowed them to survive for hours at sea.

To read: Moroccan Family of Three Drowns in Tragic Migration Attempt to Spain

Two men and a woman survived this shipwreck. Chaimae died shortly before the arrival of the maritime rescue, after having abandoned, against her will, the lifeless body of her son to the sea. The boy’s body was not found during the six days of searches carried out by the maritime rescue.

Sadik was waiting to regularize his situation in Spain before bringing his wife and son. Today, he is preparing to repatriate his wife’s body to Morocco to give her a dignified burial that he will not even be able to attend. He should be content with a final tribute in a funeral home in Los Barrios (Cadiz), before the body departs.