One hundred and seventy-three people were rescued Tuesday off the coast of Boulogne-sur-Mer. Their boat had caught fire during an attempt to cross the Channel, announced the Pas-de-Calais prefecture and the maritime prefecture. The operation is among the largest carried out since 2018.

Published on: 04/08/2026 - 12:28 Modified on: 04/08/2026 - 21:58

An overloaded boat, an engine that caught fire and a rescue operation of rare magnitude: 173 migrants were rescued on Tuesday August 4 off the coast of Boulogne-sur-Mer, in Pas-de-Calais, while they were trying to reach the United Kingdom clandestinely.

In the morning, the makeshift boat “caught fire at the limit of French and British waters, leading its occupants to throw themselves into the water,” detailed the Pas-de-Calais prefecture.

After initially listing 157 exiles supported, the maritime prefecture of the Channel and the North Sea (Prémar) in the afternoon revised its toll upwards, to 173 people rescued.

“We have no serious injuries to report,” Thierry Darras, deputy director of the Pas-de-Calais departmental fire and rescue service (Sdis), stressed in the afternoon during a press briefing at the port of Boulogne-sur-Mer.

See also Calais: meeting with migrants attempting to cross the Channel by boat

In a report released at the end of the day, the Pas-de-Calais prefecture reported 11 people slightly injured, three of whom were transported to hospital.

This is one of the main rescue operations at sea since the start of Channel crossings aboard "small boats", the term used for these precarious boats, in 2018.

This boat left Monday from Veules-les-Roses, in Seine-Maritime, Prémar said in a press release.

Tuesday's rescue is "a very visible reminder of both the dangerous nature of these crossings and the indifference that human traffickers have for the lives on these boats", reacted to the press the British Minister of Justice, Alex Norris.

The boat's engine caught fire

Initially, during the night from Monday to Tuesday, five passengers from this boat "needing to be rescued" were taken care of and disembarked in Boulogne-sur-Mer, according to Prémar. The other people on board then “refused the assistance offered by French means”.

Tuesday morning, as the boat approached British waters, its engine caught fire and “the integrity of the boat (degraded) very quickly,” adds Prémar.

Many boats were then mobilized, including "ships and a British lifeboat", according to a spokesperson for the British Maritime and Coastguard Agency. Three boats were to disembark the people rescued in Boulogne-sur-Mer, the Pas-de-Calais prefecture told AFP.

An investigation into aiding the entry and illegal stay of foreigners was opened, and a man, an Egyptian national, was arrested and placed in police custody, the Boulogne-sur-Mer public prosecutor's office told AFP.

Read alsoIn the North, NGOs face the aggressiveness of British “migrant hunters” activists

The exile aid association Utopia 56 assured AFP that around fifty women and children who were on board the boat arrived in Calais in the afternoon, without emergency accommodation.

According to the Pas-de-Calais prefecture, shelter in reception centers had been offered "to families, women and vulnerable people", but was not accepted by "none of the people rescued".

More than 60 people per boat

In recent weeks, witnesses have assured AFP that they have seen longer canoes appear, exceeding 12 meters, compared to 8 to 10 meters usually.

This "mode of action (...) is expanding singularly", Prémar recently deplored to AFP, further emphasizing that "the number of people per boat continues to increase": it has increased from 26 in 2021 to 65 since the start of 2026.

At least 15 people have also died during clandestine crossings of the Channel in 2026, according to an AFP count.

Also read: Four migrants drown during an attempt to cross the Channel

Since January, more than 14,000 people have illegally reached Britain by sea and around 200,000 since the Channel crossings began in precarious boats in 2018.

With AFP

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