Tragedy in English Channel after migrant boat SINKS leaving one useless
A migrant has died today after an overcrowded dinghy sunk while trying to cross the English Channel.
Seventy-one other people were rescued after the vessel deflated off Gravelines on France‘s northern coast, the regional maritime police authority said in a statement.
French emergency services sent a plane, two helicopters and a rescue boat to search for people drifting in the water.
All those rescued were put ashore at Calais and received by the emergency services.
The tragic death comes as Britain’s new Prime Minister Keir Starmer has vowed to tackle the migrant crisis by smashing smuggling gangs.
A migrant has died today after an overcrowded dinghy sunk while trying to cross the English Channel (file photo of small boat crossings)
The Cormoran, a French public service patrol boat, was notified at the end of day Wednesday that a dinghy had deflated off Gravelines.
French and British emergency responders rushed to provide aid to the 72 migrants who had gone overboard.
A French ship took 59 people on board, including one who was unconscious and ‘could not be revived’, the French maritime police said. A British coastguard boat took on a further 13 people.
Aircraft and vessels searched over a large area around the wreck site until dark and found no other people.
On Friday, four people were reported killed after a packed boat carrying asylum seekers capsized at 4.30am off the coast of Boulogne sur Mer, in northern France.
The regional prefect, Jacques Billant, said the four dead men were thought to be Somalian, Eritrean or Ethiopian.
He said 56 passengers were rescued from that shipwreck after their vessel likewise deflated.
Seventy-one other people were rescued after the vessel deflated off Gravelines on France ‘s northern coast. Pictured is a file photo of The Cormoran, a French public service patrol boat that was involved in today’s rescue
Five migrants including a young girl also died off the same coastal region on April 23 this year.
More than 12,000 people have made the Channel crossing so far this year, according to Home Office provisional figures released in mid-June.
The figure was 18 percent higher than for the equivalent point last year, when 10,472 people had made the crossing.
This is a breaking news story. Check back for updates.
