Four
people die in Channel small-boat sinking
French
authorities say situation still being assessed after ‘taxi-boat’ sank between
France and UK
Diane
Taylor and agency
Thu 9 Apr
2026 09.38 BST
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/apr/09/people-die-in-channel-small-boat-sinking
Two men
and two women have died after a small boat sank in the Channel between France
and Britain, French local authorities have said.
“A
taxi-boat sinking occurred today. The situation is still being assessed and
remains subject to change,” local authorities in Calais stated.
According
to the French media outlet La Voix du Nord, rescue services were called to
Équihen-Plage early on Thursday morning.
In the
past year, traffickers have been using motoring dinghies along stretches of the
northern French and Belgian coasts, picking migrants up along the shore.
Authorities refer to them as “taxi-boats”.
Wednesday’s
incident came the day after 102 people got into difficulty trying to cross the
Channel and had to be rescued.
In
another recent incident, two people died trying to cross the Channel at the
beginning of April.
The use
of taxi-boats by people smugglers is controversial as they move along the coast
picking up people at different points rather than having one fixed launching
point into the sea. There have been reports that some of these taxi-boats are
starting their journey from Belgium and then moving along the French coast.
The UK
and France are negotiating a fresh deal to stop small boats crossing the
Channel, with an interim arrangement in place after they failed to renew an
agreement that expired on 31 March.
About
2,200 refugees and migrants crossed the Channel, one of the world’s busiest
shipping lanes, to the UK in the first two months of 2026, according to data
from the University of Oxford’s Migration Observatory. About 41,500 people made
the crossing last year.
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