Four people, including a two-year-old child, have died while attempting to cross the English Channel, French authorities say.

The authorities said they were found “unconscious” and were likely “trampled to death” in two separate boats that had engine failures.

French interior minister Bruno Retailleau called the deaths a “terrible tragedy”, adding that people smugglers “have the blood of these people on their hands”.

In one of the incidents, a French rescue service picked up 15 people, including the child, and one person was airlifted to a French hospital with burns to their legs.

The prefect of the Pas-de-Calais region, Jacques Billant, said one of the boats was off the coast of Boulogne-Sur-Mer in northern France which was carrying “almost 90 people” overnight.

He said it got into difficulty after an engine failure and called French rescue services.

“A French rescue boat went to the scene and picked up 15 migrants, including an unconscious child.

“The medical team, dispatched by helicopter, was unable to save the two-year-old child, who was pronounced dead.”

According to the Boulogne-Sur-Mer prosecutor Guirec Le Bras, the child was “trampled to death”.

A person on the vessel with burns to their legs was airlifted to hospital, Billant added.

The remaining passengers on the boat continued their journey, the AFP news agency reported.

On a separate overcrowded small boat, another incident happened overnight off the coast of Calais when “multiple engine failures led to a stampede and some migrants fell into the water but were rescued”, Billant told journalists.

“Three people – two men and a woman – were then discovered unconscious inside this small boat,” he added.

“They were likely trampled to death during the stampede.”

According to French authorities, 51 migrants have lost their lives in 2024 while trying to cross the Channel to reach the United Kingdom.

“Our government will intensify the fight against these mafias who are getting rich by organising these crossings of death,” Retailleau said in a post on X.

UK Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, also posting on X, described the deaths as “appalling”, adding that “criminal smuggler gangs continue to organise these dangerous boat crossings”.

“The gangs do not care if people live or die – this is a terrible trade in lives,” she said.

She said she had been in touch with Reailleau on Saturday, and they had met in Italy at the G7 meeting earlier this week, where they had discussed the matter.

She previously said that an action plan agreed at that meeting “means new international joint investigative teams to pursue the gangs, finance and supply chains.”

Earlier this week, the country’s prime minister, Michel Barnier, said France needed a stricter immigration policy.

Barnier said he would be “ruthless” with people traffickers, adding that they “exploit misery and despair” and encourage undocumented asylum seekers to cross the Channel and the Mediterranean Sea.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer previously said he was “absolutely determined” to tackle the smuggling gangs facilitating the crossings but did not put a timeframe on that.

Figures from the Home Office show there were 395 migrants on 4 October who arrived in the UK in small boats without permission to enter the country, and 59 arrived on 29 September.

More than 25,000 people have crossed the Channel in 2024 so far.

At least 194 migrants died attempting to cross the English Channel between 2018 and September 2024, according to estimates from the International Organization for Migration, which is part of the UN.