Channel smuggling gangs resort to 'mega-dinghies' as crackdown limits small boat supply - BBC News BBC Homepage Skip to content Accessibility Help Your account Home News Sport Earth Reel Worklife Travel Culture Future Music TV Weather Sounds More menu More menu Search BBC Home News Sport Earth Reel Worklife Travel Culture Future Music TV Weather Sounds Close menu BBC News Menu Home Climate World UK Business Tech Science Entertainment & Arts Health In Pictures More BBC Verify Newsbeat World Africa Asia Australia Europe Latin America Middle East US & Canada Channel smuggling gangs resort to 'mega-dinghies' as crackdown limits small boat supply To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. This video can not be played Figure caption, The BBC watched groups of migrants boarding an inflatable dinghy on the Gravelines beach in northern France By James Waterhouse Paris correspondent , Reporting from Gravelines Published 3 September 2026 A drop in small boats illegally reaching the UK is forcing people smuggling gangs to adopt new tactics, a BBC investigation has found. And there are claims of more "mega-dinghies" being prepared, of the type seen arriving on UK shores in recent weeks. The image of a 15-metre long small boat carrying a record 230 migrants towards the UK drew condemnation from both newspapers and politicians. Ministers were accused of "losing control" of illegal Channel crossings, and the French police again found themselves criticised for not intervening. But evocative as the picture was, it also represented a new strategy by the increasingly frustrated people smugglers we encountered on France's northern shores - who attacked our crew with stones, and injured our cameraman. They are running low on small boats, we have found. And once rival criminal groups are now having to work together by loading more migrants on fewer, larger vessels - just like the "mega-dinghy". The UK and France are announcing measures to increase the number of pol