Early on October 4, the crew of the private rescue lifeboat Louise Michel tweeted that it had picked up 48 migrants "in distress from an overcrowded wooden boat" in the Mediterranean.

The rescue comes just days after the ship’s crew disembarked the last group of 88 rescued migrants on the Sicilian island of Lampedusa on October 2. The 88 were rescued at the end of September. The Louise Michel crew said 68 of that group were unaccompanied minors.

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According to the organization's website, the boat was bought from the proceeds of the sale of one of the artist Banksy's artworks. The boat is crewed by rescue professionals from all around Europe and runs on a "vegan diet."

Prior to being converted into a rescue ship, Louise Michel was a French navy boat. The boat is capable of "over 28 knots," of speed, making it one of the fastest private rescue ships at work in the Mediterranean. At 30 meters long, the Louise Michel is smaller than some of the other rescue ships and so tends to disembark those rescued much more quickly, as they are unable to stay on board for long.

More than 72,000 arrived in Italy to date

According to data from the Italian interior ministry -- updated on October 4 -- 72,252 migrants have already disembarked in Italy from the Mediterranean this year. Some are brought in by private rescue ships (around 10,000 people were rescued by NGOs and brought to Italy between January and September), others reach the Italian coastline under their own steam (around 35,000 between January and September) and thousands more are picked up by the Italian coast guard and the tax and border police Guardia di Finanza who also operate rescue missions in the Mediterranean.

Since April, the numbers of migrants registered as arriving in Italy each month have been consistently higher than the equivalent numbers for that month in the previous two years. January 2022 also recorded much higher arrival numbers than January 2021 or 2020.

Nationals coming from Egypt and Tunisia currently account for the largest groups of those arriving (both over 14,000), with Bangladeshis following close behind accounting for almost 11,000 arrivals this year alone.

With dpa and epd