Two men from Senegal, aged 24 and 33, have been arrested by the Italian police on charges of aiding and abetting clandestine migration and causing a death as a result of another crime. Their arrest had been ordered by the prosecutor's office of Agrigento, a city in southwestern Italy.

Prosecutors allege that the two men were the smugglers who steered the boat on which a fire broke out on October 21, which led to the deaths of a two-year-old toddler and an infant under a year old. Four adults are also believed to have drowned in the incident.

On board the boat were reportedly 38 migrants from Sub-Saharan countries including Ghana and the Ivory Coast.

The crew of a Tunisian fishing boat first reported that the migrant boat -- located at the time in the "Maltese search and rescue area, near ... the Italian search and rescue area" -- was in distress to authorities, according to a reconstruction by the Italian coast guard.

Italian port authorities then travelled to the coordinates and rescued the 38 migrants, some of whom, including the bodies of the two small children, had already been picked up by the fishing boat, according to Italian authorities.

Five people were reportedly injured, and taken to the Palermo burns center on the island of Sicily via helicopter. A pregnant woman in serious condition, a two-year-old toddler and a boy with burns on his legs were transferred almost immediately to Palermo. Doctors at Lampedusa medical facilities also transferred another man and a woman who had suffered burns but were not in serious condition.

Those injured and hospitalized in Palermo were reportedly interrogated by local police.

How did the fire on the migrant boat break out?

Prosecutors believe that the deadly fire was started accidentally, due to "the very bad conditions of the engine and the inexperience of the two smugglers."

Migrants interviewed by police reportedly told them that the engine stopped and had to be restarted several times during their trip.

On the night of October 21, according to the prosecutor's office, the outboard engine was stopped and one of the two smugglers accidentally produced sparks in an attempt to restart it. The sparks then reportedly lit fuel onboard the vessel on fire.

The fuel had been poured from auxiliary makeshift tanks into the engine tank, which caught fire leading to an explosion of the still full tanks and then a larger fire, prosecutors believe.

The prosecutor's office said that the fire had been extinguished with great difficulty by the migrants stuck onboard using seawater.

Survivor says her cousin was lost at sea

Police also shared what they said are the testimonies of two survivors from the boat.

"On board the vessel, among those rescued by the crew, I could not find my cousin. There was only her three-year-old son. Thus, I understood that she had died at sea, due to the explosion or drowning," a 20-year-old woman from Ivory Coast allegedly told police. She is one of the five survivors who were reportedly interviewed by officers. "During the crossing, after many hours at sea, the second night of sailing, towards 3 or 4 am while we were in the open sea, I was sleeping. I was woken up by the screams of the migrants. After a few seconds I heard a loud noise and I was thrown into the sea. Fortunately I know how to swim and thus I ended up floating in the water. From there I could see the boat in flames and people who were throwing themselves into the sea."

She reportedly continued: "Then, at a distance, I saw a life vest. I took it and put it on. The boat in flames was moving farther from me. After an hour the flames onboard were put out but I was too far away to get on. I stayed in the water for a few hours until the fishing boat rescued me."

Two children found dead, four adults believed to have drowned

A 19-year-old man from Guinea reportedly told police the following:

"The journey lasted about three days. After two days, during the night I woke up because the engine stopped and the boat had caught fire, fed by the fuel that had been stored in tanks that were [supposed to be] used for resupplying purposes. To flee the flames, we all threw ourselves into the water. I do not know whether some people remained onboard amid the flames. We stayed in the water until the morning, until a Tunisian fishing boat came close."

"The fishing boat crew also rescued some of us who had been dragged away by the current, bringing them back to our boat where, in the meantime and thanks to an intervention by some youths, the flames were put out with water from the sea. After a while, an Italian naval vessel arrived to save us. I remember that, when I climbed back onto the boat, two children -- one little boy and a little girl -- had been burned to death and four adults -- two men and two women -- [died] in the water because they had been dragged by the current and drowned."