A suspected migrant smuggling boat capsized off Imperial Beach, killing four people and leaving four others hospitalized, officials said Saturday.
The U.S. Border Patrol found the panga capsized in the water late Friday night off South Seacoast Drive, the U.S. Coast Guard said in a statement.
Authorities found six people on the beach, one person who died at the scene, and another person who was rescued underneath the capsized vessel.
Just before 2 a.m. Saturday, three other people were found dead near the Imperial Beach Pier, officials said.
Four people who were rescued were taken to the hospital. Border Patrol agents took one person into custody, the Coast Guard said.
Some of the people rescued said they were Mexican nationals; others remain unidentified, officials said.
“Our crews and partner agencies responded immediately, but this case demonstrates the severe risks posed to aliens attempting to enter the United States by sea in unstable vessels,” said Capt. Robert Tucker, Sector San Diego commander.
A strong storm system hit Southern California over the weekend, prompting warnings of flash flooding and mudslides. The vessel was a panga — a single- or twin-engine open fishing boat that is commonly used by smugglers.
Migrants are increasingly turning to the risky alternative offered by smugglers to travel by sea to avoid heavily guarded land borders, including off California’s coast. Pangas leave Mexico in the dead of night and sometimes chart hundreds of miles north.
There have been several incidents in recent years of migrant vessels capsizing en route to California.
In May, at least four people died when a panga flipped north of Torrey Pines, off the coast of Del Mar.
In 2023, eight people were killed when two migrant smuggling boats approached a San Diego beach in heavy fog and one of them capsized in the surf. It was one of the deadliest maritime smuggling incidents in waters off the U.S. coast.
A federal judge sentenced a San Diego man to 18 years in prison in 2022 for piloting a small vessel overloaded with 32 migrants that smashed apart in powerful surf off the coast, killing three people and injuring more than two dozen.
Worldwide, nearly 9,000 people died last year attempting to cross borders, according to the U.N. agency for migration. The death toll set a record for the fifth year in a row.
The U.N. Missing Migrant Project puts the number of dead and missing in the central Mediterranean at more than 24,506 between 2014 and 2024, many of them lost at sea. The project says the number may be greater as many deaths go unrecorded.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.