The maritime prefecture of the Channel indicated Thursday, August 18 to have orchestrated the help for 254 candidates for exile to England, routed in the Channel for the past four days, a sign that the departures continue to multiply.
According to the prefecture, 533 attempts to cross by boat to England, involving 18,763 migrants, were recorded in the first seven months of the year.
This figure is up by more than 50% compared to the same period in 2021, an already record year, when 12,100 people were counted.
On August 14, a French Navy patrol boat rescued 63 shipwrecked people.
The following night, a French customs coast guard patrol boat rescued 40 people.
Read alsoMigrants: the number of Channel crossings up sharply this year
On Tuesday evening, August 16, a dinghy from the Dunkirk National Sea Rescue Society (SNSM) was mobilized to bring 50 passengers ashore from a routed clandestine boat.
And on the night of the 16th to 17th, the French Navy patrol boat rescued 62 people, while a rescue tug recovered 39 others.
The perilous clandestine crossings of the English Channel, one of the busiest sea routes in the world, have become a regular source of tension between Paris and London, especially since Brexit.
