Eight migrants were killed on Sunday after their overcrowded boats capsized while attempting to cross the Channel from France to England, according to French authorities, less than two weeks after the year’s biggest such accident.
With the latest tragedy, 46 migrants have died attempting to reach British shores this year, up from 12 in 2023, according to a regional official.
For years, the French and British governments have attempted to stem the flow of migrants, who pay smugglers thousands of euros per person for passage on overcrowded rubber dinghies.
According to regional prefect Jacques Billant, the event occurred around 1:00 a.m. (2300 GMT Saturday) off the coast of the northern town of Ambleteuse.
“The toll was terrible, with eight people reported dead,” he told the press near the site of the accident.
He said they seemed all to be men.
Six survivors were hospitalised, including a 10-month-old baby with hypothermia, he added.
The boat had set off from the Slack River that flows into the sea between the towns of Wimereux and Ambleteuse.
Billant said that it had 59 people on board from Eritrea, Sudan, Syria, Afghanistan, Egypt, and Iran.
“Only one out of six had a life jacket,” he said.
The dinghy “quickly got into difficulty and ran aground”, he said. “The boat was torn apart on the rocks.”
‘Children, tiny babies’
Christel Leclair, a volunteer at a local charity, said a second boat had departed at around 7:30 am despite the fatal accident.
Departures “happen the whole time — winter, day, night, summer… as soon as the sea is calm”, she said.
“The boats are more and more overcrowded. They don’t have life jackets, just sometimes the inner tube of a tire,” she added.
“There are children, pregnant women and tiny babies. We’re sad and deflated.”
The Auberge des Migrants (Migrant shelter) charity on X called on the French and British states to “immediately rethink their migration policy”.
Billant said that this year French authorities had dismantled 20 people smuggling networks, arresting 77 people of whom 59 have been referred to the courts.
But Charlotte Kwantes, of the Utopia 56 charity helping migrants, said departures would only continue.
Without enough legal options for migrants wishing to reach the United Kingdom, “people are continuing and will continue to take the same risks, whatever the quantity of patrols and means deployed at the border”, she said.
‘Saw them die’
Maritime authorities said Saturday that migrants had made several attempts to cross the Channel in recent days, with 200 people rescued in only 24 hours on Friday and Saturday.
The new incident occurs after at least 12 migrants, including six youngsters, largely from Eritrea, were killed when their boat sank off the northern French coast on September 3.
According to British officials, almost 22,000 migrants have crossed the Channel to reach England since the beginning of the year.
This summer, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron pledged to further up “cooperation” in dealing with the influx of unlawful migrants.
Starmer’s office announced on Sunday the appointment of Martin Hewitt as chief of the new UK Border Security Command, which was established to enhance the battle against illegal migration, particularly by leading cooperative investigations with other European countries.
Hewitt will join Starmer to Rome on Monday for talks with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, where addressing illegal migration will be a top priority.
Channel crossings are often dangerous, and in November 2021, 27 migrants died when their boat capsized, the bloodiest single such accident to record.
French authorities aim to prevent migrants from entering the sea, but do not act once they are there, except for rescue, citing safety concerns.