Migrants PARAGLIDE into Ceuta - with one killed after crashing into the sea - amid fears another 'invasion' has been planned

Published: 12:02, 10 August 2026 | Updated: 12:24, 10 August 2026 This is the moment a migrant paraglides into Europe from north Africa - a day after another died trying the same stunt. Police were still searching for the sub-Saharan man today after he vanished shortly after landing at the Benzu viewpoint in Ceuta close to its land border with Morocco. Spanish cops said today people smugglers charging migrants to make the risky air crossing were being given courses lasting just a few minutes instead of the 80 to 100 hours of training normally considered appropriate before risking their lives taking to the skies. Diego Madraza, a spokesman for the AUGC Civil Guard union, said: 'They have no flight training, sometimes they are given a course lasting barely a few minutes before taking off. 'Recently in Morocco, a gang that trained migrants in this type of entry using paragliders was dismantled. 'As soon as one door closes on them, another opens, so now detection can no longer be only be sea or land, but it can also be aerial.' Footage of the new paraglider crossing on Saturday evening emerged a day after a man drowned in a failed attempt to reach Ceuta, and ahead of a feared new invasion of Spain's North African enclave following the mass border breach late last month when an estimated 72,000 migrants reached EU soil. The sub-Saharan man's body was discovered in the Mediterranean shortly after the alarm was raised around 8am on Friday morning. Police raced to the spot where he had been spotted plunging into the water in the hope of rescuing him alive but discovered him dead from a suspected drowning. A migrant was seen attempting to paraglide into Europe just a day after another died while attempting the same stunt The Red Cross and the Sur Sur organisation distributing aid in Ceuta  after migrants stormed the border on August 3, 2026 Two masked police officers stand guard as migrants queue for food and aid from the Red Cross He had tried to reach Ceuta on a paraglider via the Benzu breakwater bordering Morocco. Calling out Spain's Interior Ministry, the AUGC said on X late yesterday alongside a video of the new paragliding crossing which this time worked: 'We warned about it in January. '@interiorgob responded in writing to Congress that paraglider entries did not exist. 'Last Friday a young man died after plunging into the sea near the Benzu breakwater while attempting to enter this way. 'First documented death in Spain by this route. 'And a few hours ago another flight over the border. The video speaks for itself. 'They take off from "The dead woman", the mountain that connects the Moroccan neighbourhood of Belyounech with the border perimeter near the Benzu breakwater. 'Denying it does not make it disappear. It only prevents resources from being provided and surveillance measures from being adapted in time.' Police in Ceuta are steeling themselves for the 'real danger' of a new mass border breach from Morocco on August 15, which has been heavily promoted on social media. The Civil Guard has reportedly admitted in an internal report the risk of a second mass attempt to reach EU soil is real - and prepared for the possibility organisers could bring it forward now the August 15 date is out in public. Although most of the migrants who made it to Ceuta have returned to Morocco, officials admit 2,500 irregular migrants remain including some 1000 children, although locals insist the figure is far higher. Distressing pictures have emerged of dozens of young men, families and children sleeping on the pavement on makeshift beds made out of cardboard boxes at an industrial estate. They have also erected makeshift camps made out of bamboo and reeds on a beach near a temporary migrant holding centre. Several girls who were among the wave of migrants and remained in Ceuta have complained of being sexually assaulted after arriving and finding themselves obliged to sleep rough. On Saturday a Moroccan migrant who broke into a stranger's fifth-floor flat and crept into bed with her in his underpants was handed an expulsion order. Beatriz Ferron, 62, started screaming after waking up to find the semi-naked intruder, one of the estimated migrants who swam into Ceuta in last month's mass border breach, laying beside her. The paragliders set off from the mountain Jebel Musa in order to fly over the 20ft Cueta border fence Migrants walk on the Moroccan side of the border behind the 20-foot border fence between the two countries Migrants try to cross from Morocco into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, Thursday, July 30, 2026 Spanish army soldiers travel in military vehicles after being deployed to the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, Thursday, July 30, 2026 Terrifying footage showed scores of people seemingly breaking into homes across the city late at night Your browser does not support iframes. The intruder was arrested on Friday morning and hauled to court hours later in Spain's North African enclave. At the weekend it emerged he had pleaded guilty to a crime of breaking and entering and handed a 16-month prison sentence which was immediately substituted for deportation and a five-year ban on entering Spain. Court sources also confirmed the unnamed individual already had a deportation order hanging over his head and had been convicted of three sex assaults in Spain. Full details of his previous crimes have not been made public but the earlier removal order is said to have been issued by a court in the eastern Spanish city of Valencia. Last November five people were arrested in Morocco after police smashed a gang accused of helping migrants reach EU soil using the daring method. The suspects, said to come from different African countries, were rounded up nearly two months after a man was filmed flying over a heavily-fortified border fence into Ceuta which lies opposite Gibraltar. All Spanish police found from a search of the spot where he landed was the abandoned multi-coloured paragliding gear in undergrowth he had used for his exploit. The successful border breach was described at the time as the first of its kind ever - attempted or accomplished - between Morocco and Ceuta.