OVIEDO, Spain

At least seven women and girls died and a baby went missing after a migrant boat capsized while disembarking at the port of the Spanish island of El Hierro on Wednesday, Canary Islands emergency services said.

Among the confirmed dead are three minors – two five-year-old girls and a 16-year-old girl.

An estimated 150 people were traveling from Africa aboard the vessel, which capsized just five meters (16 feet) from the dock.

“We know that this moment is the most delicate part of the rescue,” said Anselmo Pestana, the Spanish government’s delegate in the Canary Islands. “Usually, they even escort the boat all the way to the port to avoid making the transfer at sea. This moment is very important.”​​​​​​​

He said initial reports suggested too many passengers stood up at once, causing the boat to overturn.

“A tragic moment because, as I imagine, they must have come after a very hard and very long journey, given the state of the sea,” he said, adding that the sea has been “very rough” in recent days.

“Many of them arrive in a state of stiffness, of tremendous exhaustion, which also makes it very difficult to pull them out of the water if the rescue is not immediate … It’s likely they sank very quickly because they don’t even have the ability to move that any human being would normally have under normal circumstances,” he added.

Emergency services said they were also treating a three-year-old boy and a five-year-old girl for severe non-fatal drowning. They will be transferred by helicopter to a nearby hospital.

Another four children are being taken to the hospital with shortness of breath, according to emergency services.

This is the first migrant vessel in around two weeks to have reached the small Canary Island of El Hierro.

In 2024, nearly 47,000 migrants made the treacherous journey by sea from northwest Africa to Spain’s Canary Islands. A report by NGO Walking Borders in December said nearly 10,000 more died trying.

“It is a tragedy that puts a human face on the tragedy of immigration,” Pestana said.