A beach heavy with history

Utah Beach in Normandy still draws tourists daily. On June 6, 1944, allied troops came ashore here under German machine gun fire to begin the liberation of Europe.

What happened in 1944

American troops from the US 4th Infantry Division started landing at 6.30am. By nightfall, 20,000 men and 1,700 vehicles were ashore and four miles inland.

The journey reversed

At about 3.30am last Sunday, a so-called super dinghy left the same sand carrying an estimated 130 migrants, heading for the Solent coast the D-Day fleet sailed from.

A boat built for profit

The 34ft inflatable is thought to have been imported from China by smugglers and assembled in Germany. It was overloaded from the moment it pushed off.

Four French boats, no turnback

Four miles out, French vessels intercepted it. Their rules of engagement bar them from forcing a return, so they shadowed the dinghy for ten hours and warned the UK.

The RNLI takes over

Two lifeboats from Bembridge and Yarmouth on the Isle of Wight, plus a rescue helicopter, met the dinghy mid-Channel. Everyone was moved onto the lifeboats and given lifejackets.

Two ports said no

Riding low and slow, the lifeboats radioed ahead. Portsmouth and Southampton both refused, saying they had no facilities to process a group that size.

Ashore at a public slipway

At around 5pm the migrants landed at Eastney Landing, a slipway near the Portsmouth ferry port. Word of the operation had already spread through the town.

A protest group next door

Portsmouth happens to be the base of Patriot Platform, a hard-Right group whose balaclava-clad members had shut down Dover the day before.

Protesters in the water

Some waded into the sea to meet the arriving boats. The single road in and out of Eastney was blocked by hundreds of people within minutes.

Twelve hours pinned down

Riot police held the crowd back through the night. The migrants could only be moved by coach to a Kent asylum processing centre at around 3am on Monday.

A record crossing

Over 100 mostly adult male migrants had completed the longest small boat Channel crossing ever recorded, 95 miles, more than three times the distance from Calais.

“The attempt had clearly taken both the French and the British authorities by surprise.”

The Normandy Jungle

Thirty miles from Utah Beach, in a forest above Cherbourg, sits a camp of about 15 tents on wooden pallets. An Afghan flag hangs from a tree at the entrance.

Everything left behind

Smugglers allow no bags on the dinghies, so clothes and belongings lie scattered through the camp. Litter and a broken portable toilet mark the way in.

Everyone is passing through

The camp has existed for a decade and people rarely stay long. One resident said most move on within weeks, hoping to reach family already in Britain.

“They want to come to England. They only stay here for a bit and dream of the UK.”

Why lorries stopped working

Cherbourg's port now has a four-metre barrier topped with barbed wire and tighter checks. Last year 16 people, including a pregnant woman, had to be rescued from a freezing trailer.

A quarter of a million pounds

At roughly £2,000 a head, Sunday's boat earned the gang over £250,000. An identical Chinese-made vessel sells online for £1,416.52, and the crew work for a free berth.

France is getting better

Funded by £660million a year from Britain, French police now use surveillance to break up launches before boats reach the water, and have intercepted supply routes through Turkey and the Balkans.

The dial moves west

A mega-dinghy left Dieppe in August, then Utah Beach pushed the launch point 100 miles further. A Calais-based Interior Ministry source says the shift is deliberate.

“They are finding it much harder to get boats launched in the Pas de Calais, and so are moving west.”

A far deadlier route

The crossing passes the Alderney Race, home to some of Europe's strongest currents. Nobody died on Sunday, and French authorities expect many more boats to try in the coming weeks.

“The success on Sunday proved the voyage can be done.”