After a fruitless 10-hour search in stomach-churning waves, the Senegalese navy patrol boat Walo had started its long journey back to port when its radar picked up a neon blip – another vessel was moving fast through the dark seas.
Its high nighttime speed raised the suspicions of the Walo’s crew, trained to spot the differences between ordinary fishing boats and those filled with thousands of would-be migrants attempting perilous ocean missions each year to Spain’s Canary Islands.
The number of arrivals has recently jumped as milder weather and calmer seas since September have made it more feasible to attempt the still perilous crossing from Africa.
Spain’s Interior Ministry said that a total of 30,705 undocumented migrants had reached the Canary Islands in the first 10 months of this year, representing a 111% increase from the same period in 2022.
This figure compares with the full-year record of 31,678 migrants arriving on the Canary Islands in 2006 when other routes to Europe were blocked off.
The Canary Islands accounted for the bulk of the 43,290 undocumented migrants arriving in Spain by sea last year.
