Seven bodies were recovered, and 96 people were rescued after a boat, reportedly carrying more than 200 migrants, capsized overnight in northwest Gambia, the country’s defense ministry confirmed on Thursday. Search and recovery operations are still ongoing.
CNN reported that the incident marks another tragic episode along one of the world’s most perilous migrant routes, mostly used by West Africans attempting to reach Spain via the Canary Islands.
According to the defense ministry, the boat capsized around midnight near a village in Gambia’s North Bank region and was later discovered “grounded on a sandbank.”
The rescue mission deployed three naval speedboats, a coastal patrol vessel, and “a local fishing canoe” whose operators volunteered to assist.
The ministry added that ten of the rescued migrants were in critical condition and receiving urgent medical attention, without specifying their nationalities.
Migration along this route reached a record high in 2024, with more than 46,000 irregular migrants arriving in the Canary Islands, the European Union reported.
Meanwhile, over 10,000 people died attempting the journey, a 58% increase compared to 2023, according to the rights group Caminando Fronteras.
However, during the first 11 months of 2025, irregular migration along the West African route into the European Union fell by 60%, the EU’s border agency Frontex said.
Frontex attributed the drop largely to stronger prevention efforts by departure countries in collaboration with EU member states.
The tragedy echoes a previous disaster in August 2025, when at least 70 people died after a boat, believed to have left Gambia carrying migrants, capsized in one of the deadliest accidents in recent years.
