Skipper Raymond had been sleeping when a member of his crew woke him up and said, “There are migrants alongside the boat.” Four people were killed after a small boat capsized off the coast of Kent in the early hours of this morning. Raymond estimated that 45 people were clinging to the collapsed dinghy. “It was like something out of a second world war movie, with people screaming in the water everywhere,” he said. The fishing crew can be seen hauling the terrified passengers over the side of the boat in footage shared. “When the dinghy began to drift away, I steamed towards it and we secured it with a rope to the side of the boat,” he explained. We were attempting to get them off the dinghy.” They informed me that they had paid £5,000 to a smuggler in France. “Adrenaline kicks in and you find the strength to get these guys safe,” Raymond’s fishing crew said after spending two hours pulling people from the water. He stated that those he rescued were from Afghanistan, Iraq, Senegal, and India, and that they had each paid a smuggler in France £5,000 for passage into the UK. However, as the crew began to pull away, bringing the passengers into port, they discovered that one migrant had attached himself to the side of the boat and drowned. “The next thing I knew, this rope was tied to a dead body. “We had been concentrating on the port side, and this one person had swum to the starboard side, tied a rope onto my fishing gear, and tied it around his wrist to keep himself alongside the boat. “When I started my boat, his body floated up.” Crew provided them with “any clothes they had.” According to a government source, 43 people were rescued alive and brought to the UK. Some of those rescued were taken from the boat, while others were pulled from the water. Raymond claims that after being pulled from the water, he gave everyone a “lukewarm shower” to gradually warm them up. “We stripped off all their wet clothes, and my crew gave them whatever clothes they had to keep warm,” he explained. He claimed that all 31 people rescued by Raymond’s team had survived. “It was very fortunate that the sea conditions were favourable. “It was freezing,” he said. When we arrived in Dover, a medical team came down and checked on them, and he couldn’t believe how well they were doing; none of them had any severities.” The search will continue throughout the day, but at this point, more people are feared dead due to the icy conditions, with temperatures dropping to -4 degrees Celsius overnight. According to the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, HM Coastguard is collaborating with the RNLI, Royal Navy, Border Force, French navy, and Kent Police to locate the boat, and an air ambulance has been dispatched to the scene. We are aware of an incident in UK waters, and all relevant agencies are supporting a coordinated response,” a UK government spokesperson said. More information will be provided in due course.” Home Secretary Suella Braverman said in a Commons statement that it was a “terrible tragedy”, and she had spoken to her French counterpart and is working “closely with the local authorities.
