Dozens missing, 9 dead in migrant boat wreck off Spanish Canaries

MADRID – Nine people are confirmed drowned and at least 48 are missing after a boat carrying migrants capsized off Spain’s Canary Islands overnight, rescue services said Saturday, the latest in a series of such disasters off the west coast of Africa.Sea rescue teams said in a statement they had answered a distress call off El Hierro, one of the islands in the Atlantic archipelago, shortly after midnight. They managed to save 27 people out of 84 on board.Anselmo Pestana, head of the Canary Islands prefecture, said survivors had told their rescuers that the boat had set off from Nuadibu in…