500 refugees storm Channel Tunnel

Police guard three refugees arrested at the tunnel

CALAIS, France -- The Channel Tunnel has been reopened after some 500 refugees trying to get to Britain stormed the French entrance in two waves.

Authorities arrested 129 refugees who broke through security in the first wave on Tuesday night and got about one-quarter of the way into the tunnel.

The tunnel between the UK and France was closed to passenger and cargo trains after the refugees stormed past security guards and broke through electronic locks at about 9:15 p.m. (2015 GMT).

A second wave of some 400 refugees tried to storm the tunnel using the same entrance about midnight (0100 GMT) on Wednesday but were turned back by French riot police, according to a spokesman for Eurotunnel, which operates the undersea rail link between France and Britain.

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The 40-kilometer (25-mile) tunnel reopened at 5:45 a.m. (0645 GMT) on Wednesday after an exhaustive search that lasted more than 10 hours, said Eurotunnel spokesman Kevin Charles.

"The tunnel is all clear," Charles told CNN. "None of the refugees reached the UK."

"We saw them coming on our CCTV cameras but it was impossible to stop them. We had approximately 20 guards there but they had no chance," Eurotunnel spokeswoman Anne Leva said.

Eurotunnel said security officials called in French police, and British police joined the hunt using sniffer dogs.

Police used tear gas to disperse the second group of refugees, who were arrested and sent back to the Red Cross centre in nearby Sangatte, The Associated Press reported.

There are no Eurostar passenger trains on December 25 and 26, and it is believed that the refugees were trying to take advantage of reduced traffic in the tunnel.

It is not unusual for refugees to try to enter the UK through the tunnel, but such a mass attempt is rare.

Eurotunnel says it intercepted about 18,500 refugees trying to cross through the tunnel in the first half of 2001 alone, and that it has repeatedly asked officials to move the Sangatte refugee centre.