Two migrants were found dead and another four were hospitalised while 34 others were pulled to safety after their boat got into trouble off the Canary Islands, Spanish rescuers said Tuesday.

The incident occurred late on Monday when the Salvamento Maritimo rescue service was tipped off about a boat in difficulty 76 nautical miles south of Gran Canaria, one of the Atlantic archipelago's seven islands.

A Salvamento Maritimo spokeswoman told AFP they had found two bodies on the boat, saying "four people were urgently evacuated" by helicopter to a hospital on Gran Canaria.

Another 34 people were pulled to safety, among them 27 men and six women, who arrived at Gran Canaria's Arguineguin port at dawn.

In a post on X, formerly Twitter, the 112 emergency services said the four who were evacuated were in "serious condition" and that they had sent a large team to the port to treat the survivors.

Interior ministry figures show that by the end of February, 11,932 migrants had arrived on the Canary Islands on 181 boats, compared with just 1,865 arriving on 42 boats in the same period last year.

Last year, nearly 40,000 migrants arrived in the Canaries, up from some 15,600 in 2022, and surpassing the record set in 2006.

The Atlantic route is particularly dangerous due to the strong currents, with migrants travelling in overloaded boats, which are often unseaworthy, and without enough drinking water.

But it has grown in popularity due to increased vigilance in the Mediterranean, with migrants fleeing poverty and conflict in Africa.

Many boats -- often long wooden fishing vessels known as pirogues -- leave ports in Morocco, Western Sahara or Mauritania, but also increasingly come from countries further south such as Gambia and Senegal.