Government Orders Probe Into Deadliest English Channel Capsize That Killed 27 Migrants

A group of people thought to be migrants are brought in to Dover, Kent, by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution on Nov. 25, 2021. Gareth Fuller/PA

The government has ordered an inquiry on Thursday into the drowning of at least 27 migrants in the English Channel when they attempted to head to the UK in November 2021.

It comes after the Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) published an investigation report on the deadliest migrant incident in the Channel, saying the UK’s search and rescue mission was hampered “due to poor visibility and by the lack of a dedicated aircraft conducting aerial surveillance of the Dover Strait.”

Announcing an independent non-statutory inquiry into the incident, Transport Secretary Mark Harper said a “thorough and independent investigation” will “give the families of the victims the clarity they deserve.”

The inquiry will “look into who the deceased were, and when, where and in what circumstances they came by their deaths,” the Department for Transport (DfT) said.

It will also “consider what further lessons can be learned” and “if appropriate, make recommendations to reduce the risk of a similar event occurring.”

The DfT said it will appoint a chair and publish the full terms of reference in due course.

Poor Visibility

On Nov. 24, 2021, a UK-bound inflatable boat partly sank while crossing the Dover Strait with 33 people onboard.

According to the MAIB, two people were rescued, 27 have been confirmed dead, and four people remain missing.

Last year, UK police arrested a man who allegedly facilitated the crossing. The man, Harem Ahmed Abwbaker, was extradited to France in July to face manslaughter, human trafficking, and organised crime charges.

French prosecutors have also preliminarily charged five maritime rescue personnel in May for not assisting people in danger.

Andrew Moll, MAIB chief inspector of marine accidents, said there have been “multiple inflatable boats that were unsuitable and ill-equipped for the journey attempting to cross the Dover Strait to England” on the fateful day.

According to the report, the sunken boat is believed to have left Dunkirk at around 9 p.m. on Nov. 23, 2021, and began to take on water about four hours later, on what was a busy day for HM Coastguard.

On Nov. 24, 2024, HM Coastguard “recorded 99 separate migrant incidents,” the report said.

According to the report, analysis indicated that the helicopter search “was in the appropriate location and that the pattern was suitable for detecting small boats in the prevailing conditions,” adding, “it was likely that the occupants of the stricken boat were not found because of the relatively poor visibility and the aerial search was optimised for detection of small boats rather than people in the water.”

Poor Information

But the difficulty in getting useful information also contributed to the tragedy.

Distress calls came in from a number of boats and some callers were providing duplicate information, the report said.

A damaged inflatable small boat on the shore in Wimereux, Calais, northern France, on Nov. 25, 2021. Michel Spingler/AP Photo

“It was extremely challenging for coastguard operatives to distil useful information from these calls and correlate it with information obtained from other sources such as the French tracker.”

According to the report, three migrant boats were found in UK waters during the search for the distressed and sinking boat, “all with similar numbers of people on board to those reported to be on the stricken craft; however, none were in the expected level of peril when located.

“The investigation found that there was an assumption that the first boat to be found was the stricken craft. This likely happened because there was no reliable way to identify a particular boat, or easily distinguish between boats, and the number of boats that had entered UK waters was unknown,” the report said.

The report also said facilitators of the illegal crossings have been coaching people to “claim high levels of distress when in UK waters in the hope of expediting rescue,” contributing to the challenges for operators to identify real peril.

The exaggerations resulted in more calls claiming severe peril, which may have buried genuine distress. They may also have created a “mental threshold” in coast guard personnel, leading them to assume migrants were in less severe peril than they claimed, according to the report.

The MAIB also said a number of HM Coastguard capacity enhancements had been identified at the time of the accident, but were not yet in place to support the UK’s emergency response.

“The report acknowledges that significant changes have been made since the accident. However, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency and Border Force are recommended to develop procedures to ensure effective surveillance of the Dover Strait is possible when aviation assets are unavailable. A recommendation is also made to the Maritime and Coastguard Agency to work with French authorities to improve the transfer of information between UK and French coastguard agencies during migrant crossing events,” Mr. Moll said in a statement.

According to the DfT, 1,227 people attempted to cross the Channel on that day.