The crews of the Tunisian-flagged fishing boats watched the spectacle with curiosity and fascination. A speedboat with three people on board approached the barge and began handing out safety vests and face masks before radioing to the Open Arms, which immediately set a course for the location to facilitate the rescue. After reassuring the passengers, who were shouting to make themselves heard among the waves, they waited for the NGO boat to approach to proceed to embark them, carefully and one by one, first in the boats and then on the deck of the ship, where a dozen sailors and volunteers equipped with PPE identified them, assigned them a number and gave them water, food and a blanket. And so, three times in three days, three operations that saved 219 people from probable shipwreck, overshadowed by dozens of warnings of boats in distress that were not so lucky because they were never found or because the Libyan coastguard moved forward to return their crew members to their point of departure.