Five migrants trying to get to Britain on a small boat suffocated after getting trapped underneath the dinghy due to the weight of those already on board, French investigators have said.
A criminal enquiry was underway in France last night following the five deaths – including that of a four-year-old girl – in the English Channel.
The migrants are understood to have suffocated in a gruesome accident on a small boat which then continued on its way to Britain.
People smugglers are suspected of charging up to £1000-a-head to board the inflatable dinghy packed with 112 people, instead of an advised 20.
It got in to difficulty early on Tuesday morning off Wimereux beach, near Boulogne-sur-Mer, flinging around 50 people into the bitterly cold water.
Some of those who fell in, including the four-year-old girl, got caught underneath the boat and were trapped by the weight of those still on board.
‘They were effectively suffocated while struggling to get out of the trap,’ said an investigating source.
‘Others on board simply wanted to get on with the journey to Britain, and this is exactly what happened.’
The scene in northern France as migrants try to board boats
Once the migrants were in the boat, the officers said there was nothing more they could do
A dingy crammed with migrants was seen arriving in Dover, escorted by a French warship
Three search-and-rescue SAMU helicopters were scouring the sea for survivors
It was escorted by a French warship, while a lifeboat and a Border Force cutter picked it up as it crossed the channel
Guirec Le Bras, the port town’s prosecutor, said an enquiry has been launched into ‘manslaugher, criminal association, and the assistance of foreigners in an irregular situation’.
Some alleged smugglers were arrested overnight on Monday to Tuesday, and their nautical equipment confiscated, said Mr Le Bras.
This included boats similar to the one used, which are designed for 20 people maximum.
Mr Le Bras also confirmed that police fought running battles in the lead up to the drowning of three men, a woman in her early 30s, and the four-year-old girl.
Video footage showed groups of people heading towards the English Channel as they tried to evade the officers at around 3am.
Once the migrants were in the water police retreated, in accordance with safety regulations, leaving around five boats to head towards England.
The boat with 112 people on board hit a sandbank off Wimereux beach, causing mass panic as the outboad engine stalled.
Jacques Billant, the Pas-de-Calais Prefect, said: ‘The boat had set out to sea from the Allemands beach at Wimereux.
‘A few hundred meters from the coast, the engine stopped and several people fell into the water.
‘The Naval patrol boat Abeille Normandie [Normandy Bee] was immediately scrambled by the Maritime Prefect to rescue the shipwrecked people.
Among the migrants as they arrived in Dover was a woman with a broken leg
Many of the passengers’ legs were hanging over the side as they precariously stayed inside
A helicopter of the Emergency medical services takes off from Wimereux on April 23
Emergency vehicles were seen beside an ice cream shop on the beach at Wimereux in France
‘At the scene, sailors were able to note the presence in the boat of several inanimate people and in huge trouble.
‘Six people were immediately picked up within the patrol boat for initial treatment before being dropped off as quickly as possible on the beach to be treated by firefighters and other emergency services workers.
‘Despite attempts at resuscitation, five of them were declared dead at the scene.’
Mr Billant said everything was being done to try to identify the deceased, who were declared dead at around 7am.
Those rescued included Syrians, Iraqis, Turks, Iranians and Kuwaitians.
Mr Billant said: ‘Some 112 people were packed into that boat. It was unseaworthy – not properly inflated and completely overcrowded. To send people into the sea in a boat in that state is an act of murder. We arrested five people in relation to human trafficking offences this morning.’
Despite this, 57 people remained on the stricken boat, restarted the engine and were escorted by the French Navy, before arriving in the UK at around midday.
Mr Billant said: ‘They remained on board, not wanting to be rescued.. They managed to restart the engine and decided to continue their sea route towards Britain under naval surveillance.’
He said he had ‘never seen a boat so overcrowded,’ adding: ‘The smugglers normally pack them with 50 people maximum, but not more than 100.’
By 11am, funeral directors could be seen collecting bodies around Boulogne, while migrants suffering from conditions such as hypothermia were taken to hospital.
The father of the four-year-old girl was rescued by emergency services and taken to Wimereux beach, where he burst into tears and fell into the arms of a refugee charity worker.
Dany Patoux, of the Osmose 62 refugee charity, said: ‘We knew the little girl well. We have photos with her, with a big smile on her face, in the hope of a better life.
‘But now, everything is ruined. Her father fell into our arms right away. He was crying, in a daze. He saw his little daughter die before his eyes.’
A French emergency services spokesman said: ‘Weather conditions are good, and this is one of the reasons that so many small boats set off this morning.’
It came hours after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda Bill to deter migrants from making the perilous crossing was passed in Parliament.
He vowed to let nothing ‘stand in our way’, as he geared up to send Channel migrants to Rwanda, in Africa, as part of a deportation plan.
Last year, there were 67,337 asylum applications to the UK, and 29,437 of them came from people who arrived in small boats.
The Prime Minister claimed that the ‘tragic’ events in France ‘underscored’ the need for the deterrent effect of the Rwanda plan.
An emergency SAMU air ambulance was one of three that responded to the tragedy
A police officer looks on in Wimereux, near Calais, after migrants died in an attempt to cross the English Channel
Rescue boats were also seen off the coast of northern France as emergency services searched for survivors
Emergency workers rushed to the sea in a bid to save migrants who got in trouble while trying to cross the Channel
It is thought the small boat was launched from Wimereux in northern France, between Boulogne and Calais
He said: ‘We want to prevent people making these very dangerous crossings. If you look at what’s happening, criminal gangs are exploiting vulnerable people. They are packing more and more people into these unseaworthy dinghies.’
The furious Mayor of Wimereux meanwhile said the latest tragedy was all the fault of the British.
Jean-Luc Dubaele said: ‘Five dead in January, five dead in April. What are we waiting for?
‘Why do the English welcome them? Why do they absolutely want to travel to England? These are the questions that need to be asked.’
He said: ‘It is Britain that is responsible for the boats setting off across the English Channel and the deaths that occur in the sea.
‘The English pay us to stop the boats setting off but they look after the migrants when they arrive on their shores.
‘The English give them accommodation, food, a bank account, and let them work without regulation.
‘It is the English who are responsible for every boat that sails across the Channel to England.
‘This has been going on for more than 20 years – migrants crossing to England illegally.
‘I have been mayor for four years and I’ve watched as more and more boats leave from these shores and more people die in the sea.’
A total of 14 UK-bound migrants have drowned in the English Channel so far this year alone.
Mr Dubaele has frequently described Britain as an ‘immigrant El Dorado’, saying easy access to benefits, and a chance to work in the UK’s black economy, attracted thousands from around the world.
Following a similar lethal tragedy at Wimereux in January, Mr Dubaele said: ‘At the political level, we will have to change the situation, and bang our fist on the table with the English.
‘Migrants today want to go to England because they are well received there, they can work there without problem.’
The deaths deaths followed a night of frenzied activity by French police, as they tried to stop small boats being launched towards England.
Mr Dubaele said four alleged people smugglers were arrested in the Wimereux area.
Officers confirmed they had confiscated nautical equipment including two boats.
One of the helicopters was seen flying low over the beach at Wimereux
Another air ambulance was seen landing at the side of the beach in Wimereux
A member of the French Gendarmerie talks with a driver of a passing car in Wimereux, near Calais
French police stopped another boat (pictured) from leaving northern France
Posting a picture of them on Twitter X, they wrote: ‘Last night at Wimereux, the police foiled two deliveries of nautical equipment (2 boats, 2 cans of fuel, 2 engines and life jackets) It was handed over to the police. Our objective – Save Lives’.
The same force – France’s National Police – also arrested an individual transporting 14 migrants in a single vehicle.
‘He was taken into custody and faces charges,’ said a police spokesman.
Five migrants drowned while trying to get to Britain from Wimereux beach on January 14.
In August last year, six people died after a boat carrying migrants sank in the Channel off the French coast.
And in November 2021, at least 27 migrants died after a dinghy sank while heading to the UK – the highest recorded number of deaths from a single incident.
Yesterday a dingy crammed with migrants was seen arriving in Dover at lunchtime. It was believed to be the boat containing the remaining survivors.
Many of the passengers’ legs were hanging over the side as they precariously stayed inside.
Among the migrants as they arrived in Dover was a woman with a broken leg.
It was escorted by a French warship, while a lifeboat and a Border Force cutter picked it up as it crossed the channel.
French police were beaten back by migrants with sticks and firecrackers moments before the boat capsized in the Channel and left five people dead including the little girl.
Three men, a woman and a four-year-old girl drowned after the dinghy they were on flipped over in the early hours of the morning off the coast of northern France, casting around 112 people into the Channel.
It was one of four that French police stopped from launching
The furious Mayor of Wimereux Jean-Luc Dubaele (pictured) said the latest tragedy was all the fault of the British
The regional governor of the Calais region, Prefet Jacques Billant (pictured), condemned the human traffickers who packed the morning’s victims into the boat
Footage showed scores of people running towards the sea as they tried to beat back the French officers on Wimereux beach in northern France early yesterday morning.
Once the migrants were in the water, the French police said there was nothing more they could do as they didn’t have a boat.
Moments later, the boat hit a sandbank and caused panic that led to the boat capsizing and five people – including a little girl – drowning.
Only then did French police scramble a boat to save the remaining survivors.
However, when some of the migrants refused to be rescued and restarted the boat’s engine, the French Navy instead escorted them onwards towards Britain, which they reached at around lunchtime yesterday.
The migrants had got into difficulty when the dinghy struck a sandbank exposed by the retreating tide.
This sparked panic and caused people to stand up, which unbalanced the boat.
People started falling into the water before the boat capsized, ‘flinging everybody into the very cold sea,’ a French maritime prefect said.
The French Navy intervention tug the Abeille Normandie (the Normandy Bee) was scrambled and picked up 47 survivors.
They were taken back to France, where four of them were arrested.
Yet 57 people refused to leave the boat, restarted the engine and were escorted towards Britain by the French navy.
Three search-and-rescue SAMU helicopters have been scouring the sea for survivors.
By 11am, funeral directors could be seen collecting bodies around Boulogne, while migrants suffering from conditions such as hypothermia were taken to hospital.
Most of the migrants on board were paying the equivalent of up to £1,000 per head for a voyage, meaning a single boat could be worth £100,000 to a smuggler.
An investigating source based in Boulogne said ‘at least five’ overcrowded small boats were seen pushing from the beach at Wimereux at around 3am yesterday.
He said: ‘Weather conditions were very calm, and hundreds of people were trying to get onto the boats at first light.
‘Officers had already dispersed a number of them on Monday night, and confiscated nautical equipment including inflatable boats, outboard engines, life jackets and cans of fuel.’
Despite the police operation, hundreds of men, women and children still managed to launch dinghies.
The source added: ‘All the boats were overcrowded, clearly because the people smugglers who organised them wanted to make as much money as possible.
Another overloaded dinghy was pictured in French waters after the incident
Migrants, many of them in life jackets, were seen with their feet dangling in the water
They were escorted by French patrol boat Minck and met in the Channel by a UK Border Force ship
‘There were more than 100 people on single boats, which is incredibly dangerous, and the reason they capsized — the boats just can’t take the weight of all those people.
‘There were lots of children on the boats, including a four-year-old girl who died.’
The little girl’s father was rescued by emergency services and taken to Wimereux beach, where he burst into tears and fell into the arms of refugee charity workers ‘in a daze’.
The regional governor of the Calais region, Prefet Jacques Billant, condemned the human traffickers who packed the victims into the boat.
He told : ‘Some 112 souls were packed into that boat. It was unseaworthy – not properly inflated and completely overcrowded.
‘To send people into the sea in a boat in that state is an act of murder.
‘We arrested five people on human trafficking offences this morning.’
Prefet Billant refused to offer comment on Britain’s Rwanda deportation plan.
He said simply: ‘My job is to stop the people traffickers and I will use every resource at my disposal to do so.’
A spokesman for the French coastguard said: ‘The situation is ongoing and multiple search and rescue teams are in the area.’
Olivier Ternicien, president of Osmose 62, which is based at Boulogne, said: ‘A child has died. A third helicopter has just arrived, we fear the worst.’
A criminal investigation into the deaths has been opened by the Boulogne-sur-Mer prosecutor.
It came just hours after Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda Bill to deter migrants from making the perilous crossing was passed in Parliament.
Rishi Sunak vowed to let nothing ‘stand in our way’ as he gears up to send Channel migrants to Rwanda within weeks after the Government’s deportation plan was finally passed by Parliament.
Last year, there were 67,337 asylum applications to the UK. Of those, 29,437 came from people who arrived in small boats.
The Rwanda scheme’s capacity is 200 people per year. It means if the scheme had been running last year, it would have deported less than 0.7 per cent of small boat migrants.
In terms of the cost of the journey per person, for the first 300 migrants sent to Rwanda, it will cost the Government £1.8million per head, Whitehall’s official spending watchdog said.
After the incident, the Prime Minister said the ‘tragic’ incident reported in the Channel ‘underscores’ the need for the deterrent effect of the Rwanda plan.
Several dinghies were seen being removed from the water after a series of crossings
Empty dinghies, believed to have carried migrants, are taken off a recovery boat at the Port of Dover
A person is carried on a stretcher as a group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, by the RNLI following a small boat incident in the Channel
He said: ‘That is just a reminder of why our plan is so important because there’s a certain element of compassion about everything that we’re doing.
‘We want to prevent people making these very dangerous crossings. If you look at what’s happening, criminal gangs are exploiting vulnerable people. They are packing more and more people into these unseaworthy dinghies.
‘We’ve seen an enormous increase in the numbers per boat over the past few years. This is what tragically happens when they push people out to sea and that’s why, for matters of compassion more than anything else, we must actually break this business model and end this unfairness of people coming to our country illegally.
‘I just want to pay tribute to our Border Force and the French who have cooperated as they always do to rescue people.’
‘But as I said it underscores why you need a deterrent very simply. People need to know that if they try and come here illegally they won’t be able to stay, they’ll be returned either to their own country or Rwanda. And I’m pleased that the Bill has passed through Parliament in the face of lots of Labour opposition, it was a late night.’
Migrants were taken into Dover, Kent, for processing
British officials were seen guiding the migrants in life jackets from the boat
A group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, by the Border Force following a small boat incident in the Channel
However, the furious Mayor of Wimereux said the latest tragedy was all the fault of the British.
Jean-Luc Dubaele said: ‘Five dead in January, five dead in April. What are we waiting for? ‘Why do the English welcome them? Why do they absolutely want to travel to England? These are the questions that need to be asked.’
He told : ‘It is Britain who are responsible for the boats setting off across the English Channel and the deaths that occur in the sea.
‘The English pay us to stop the boats setting off but they look after the migrants when they arrive on their shores.
‘The English give them [migrants] accommodation, food, a bank account, and let them work without regulation.
‘It is the English who are responsible for every boat that sails across the Channel to England.
‘This has been going on for more than 20 years – migrants crossing to England illegally.
‘I have been mayor for four years and I’ve watched as more and more boats leave from these shores and more people die in the sea.
‘This year 14 people have drowned in the sea so far. I’ve had enough.
‘This latest plan to send migrants to Rwanda will do nothing to stop the traffic.
‘If the English want to stop the migrants then they should stop looking after them. Stop the free housing, stop the free food, stop the bank accounts, stop letting them work.
‘That is how to stop the boats, not making us spend all our resources [the police and the army] of stopping them set off from our beaches.’
The outspoken mayor said he feared a huge increase in small boat crossings this summer when the French law and order authorities will be preoccupied with Olympic Games.
He said: ‘I fear what will happen here during the Olympic Games. All of the Forces of Order – the police and the soldiers – will be sent to Paris. So there will be no one to stop the human traffickers.
‘There will be more boats, more migrants and more deaths. It will be a catastrophe.’
Mr Dubaele has frequently described Britain as an ‘immigrant El Dorado’, saying easy access to benefits, and a chance to work in the UK’s black economy, attracted thousands from around the world.
The deaths followed a night of frenzied activity by French police, as they tried to stop small boats being launched towards England.
Mr Dubaele said four alleged people smugglers were arrested in he Wimereux areas.
Officers confirmed they had confiscated nautical equipment including two boats at Wimereux.
There were so many people on board that the ship was extremely low in the water
Dozens of migrants were seen on a boat (pictured) in Calais. It is not believed to be the same boat that got into trouble
Another boatload of migrants were seen on an RNLI ship
The migrants were guided to shore by volunteers from the lifeboat charity
The first asylum seekers are expected to be rounded up and detained within days after a political tussle over the controversial law finally ended in the early hours of the morning.
The House of Lords had been engaged in an extended tussle over the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill on Monday, sending it back to the Commons five times in a bid to secure changes.
But they relented just after midnight, paving the way for it to become law and allow delayed flights to start in July, in a move Tories hope will boost the party’s hopes of being re-elected later this year.
The news did not appear to have filtered across the Channel, with more migrants boats filmed leaving the French coast near Dunkirk heading for Britain.
In a statement the PM, who is in Poland, said: ‘The passing of this legislation will allow us to do that and make it very clear that if you come here illegally, you will not be able to stay.
‘Our focus is to now get flights off the ground, and I am clear that nothing will stand in our way of doing that and saving lives.’
Illegal Migration Minister Michael Tomlinson was on Good Morning Britain when it was reported that five migrants had died. He said he was ‘absolutely stunned’.
GMB presenter Susanna Reid suggested the Rwanda Bill would do little to stop the issue of migrants crossing in small boats.
The Prime Minister has said ‘nothing will stand in our way’ of getting flights off the ground after the Government’s Rwanda deportation plan passed through Parliament
Last year, there were 67,337 asylum applications to the UK. Of those, 29,437 came from people who arrived in small boats. The Government claims the Rwanda scheme will act as a deterrent, however it only has the capacity to send 200 people a year to the East African country
Planes have already been booked and migrants will soon be detained ahead of deportation, he revealed (pictured: staff boarding a plane which was set to be the first to transport migrants to Rwanda in June 2022)
She said: ‘If dying in the Channel isn’t going to put them off, being sent to Rwanda’s not going to defer them.’
Mr Tomlinson said the threat of going to Rwanda was a deterrent. He said: ‘I’m determined to stop the boats. The deterrent effect will be up and running.’
‘We are doing lots with the French. We want to do more.’
Referring to the tragedy, he said: ‘It is absolutely chilling to hear that. We have had fatalities now in the Channel for nine consecutive months.’
The Refugee Council described reports of deaths in the English Channel as ‘devastating’ and ‘all the more tragic’ coming just hours after the Rwanda Bill was passed in Parliament.
Enver Solomon, the council’s chief executive, said: ‘It is shocking to learn of the terrible loss of yet more lives in the Channel. Our thoughts go out to the families and loved ones of those affected.
‘This is another devastating human tragedy that could and should have been avoided – and for it to happen just hours after the Government’s Rwanda Bill became law makes it all the more tragic.
Pictured: Prime Minister Rishi Sunak leaving Parliament
‘The only sustainable way to reduce dangerous journeys across the world’s busiest shipping lane is for the Government to reduce the need for desperate people to take desperate actions.
‘Instead of hostile, headline-grabbing legislation, we need to see safe routes for those fleeing conflict and persecution, including more options for family reunion, refugee visas, and cooperation with our European neighbours.
‘We don’t need costly and unworkable laws – we need a fair and humane process that upholds the right to asylum, ensuring refugees are treated with dignity and respect.’
It follows five migrants dying while trying to get to Britain on January 14. Some 29,000 people reached the UK in small boats in 2023, despite the British government saying that stopping them was a priority.
In August last year, six people died after a boat carrying migrants sank in the Channel off the French coast, while n November 2021, at least 27 migrants died after a dinghy sank while heading to the UK – the highest recorded number of deaths from a single incident.