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dpa
London
Migrants crossing the Channel in small boats face “terrifying” conditions that no commercial fishermen would risk, according to local specialists.
The dinghies used by the people traffickers would be tossed around by 5-metre swells with freezing temperatures and cold sea spray putting the men, women and children at risk of hypothermia.
Craig Collins, of Channel Angling in Dover, Kent, told the PA news agency: “It’s brutal out there, at the moment we’re getting north-westerlies which will just smash the boats. “They are coming straight into them, it would be difficult to even get off the beaches and they’ll be facing 5-metre swells, it’s horrendous out there.
“It would be really hard out there. I wouldn’t want to be out there and no commercial fisherman would go out in that. It’s tragic they are trying to do it.
“It’s not just the cold, it’s the spray from the water, they will be hypothermic in 20 minutes out there.” Another fisherman, Manny, said: “It’s terrifying, you would think you are going to die. I used to be a commercial fisherman in a 32-foot [9.75-metre] boat and we wouldn’t go out in the conditions that they do and these people haven’t got anything, they’re just in small dinghies.”
London
Migrants crossing the Channel in small boats face “terrifying” conditions that no commercial fishermen would risk, according to local specialists.
The dinghies used by the people traffickers would be tossed around by 5-metre swells with freezing temperatures and cold sea spray putting the men, women and children at risk of hypothermia.
Craig Collins, of Channel Angling in Dover, Kent, told the PA news agency: “It’s brutal out there, at the moment we’re getting north-westerlies which will just smash the boats. “They are coming straight into them, it would be difficult to even get off the beaches and they’ll be facing 5-metre swells, it’s horrendous out there.
“It would be really hard out there. I wouldn’t want to be out there and no commercial fisherman would go out in that. It’s tragic they are trying to do it.
“It’s not just the cold, it’s the spray from the water, they will be hypothermic in 20 minutes out there.” Another fisherman, Manny, said: “It’s terrifying, you would think you are going to die. I used to be a commercial fisherman in a 32-foot [9.75-metre] boat and we wouldn’t go out in the conditions that they do and these people haven’t got anything, they’re just in small dinghies.”
