Yachts easy way to bring in migrants - ex-smuggler

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P.s. I would be more suspicious of the old coasters who anchor in sandwich bay just south of ramsgate about 500m out. Overnight they could drop off dozens of people into tenders.
 
Some years back at a boat Mrs and I were chatting to a borders agency bloke who had recently caught a boat sneaking into the Hamble with a load of illegals, He said then that their mistake had been to try to sneak in quietly at 0200 Monday morning when they were very conspicuous. He said if they came in at around 4 or 5pm on a busy Sunday they would never be noticed among the dozens of boats coming in from a weekend away or racing round the cans.
 
Daedelus said:
Some years back at a boat Mrs and I were chatting to a borders agency bloke who had recently caught a boat sneaking into the Hamble with a load of illegals, He said then that their mistake had been to try to sneak in quietly at 0200 Monday morning when they were very conspicuous. He said if they came in at around 4 or 5pm on a busy Sunday they would never be noticed among the dozens of boats coming in from a weekend away or racing round the cans.
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Getting to the mooring would be easier, but getting the cargo ashore might be trickier. I think I'd prefer to use one of those little marinas on the S side of the Itchen, in Southampton. Bonus for that plan, there are so many Chinese people in Southampton, a few more wouldn't be noticed.
 
potentillaCO32 said:
I think they do know. When I crossed from Dover heading to dieppe last I took a few wee degrees liberties with the TSS crossing at 90 rule, as you do, and got a call from channel VTS it's who said they could see me oth on radar and AIS. I told them I was going as close to 90 as I could and they were fine. But it shows that the authorities have a very good idea of who is crossing the channel. I would think absence of AIS would attract more interest.
You might get away with it once but would get caught very quickly in my view. Even if going to a muddy essex creek.
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Well the authorities might know who you are and what course you're on from afar but it's not so easy to spot the half a hundred kilo of Colombia's finest marching powder or the couple of illegal bodies you've got hidden down below.

And that's the thing - despite all the political posturing and the millions of pounds of taxpayers money said authorities throw at solving the problem it'd be quite something to find out how much illegality actually escapes detection.

I'll bet even if they knew they'd be keeping very quiet about it.
 
A few years ago it was very rare to find anybody around at any of the small aerodromes on both sides of the channel.
Even Biggin.
 
Sea Change said:
I introduce my wife as 'my first wife'.
Good to keep her on her toes.
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Sea Change said:
I introduce my wife as 'my first wife'.
Good to keep her on her toes.
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My late wife objected to being described as my second wife - I've been widowed twice, and in the UK it's a perfectly unobjectionable phrase. Unfortunately, "second wife" has the implication of "concubine" or "mistress" in Hong Kong, where she came from!
 
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