Exode

This first episode begins as hundreds of thousands of refugees from Syria arrive in the Turkish port of Izmir. We meet eleven-year-old Isra'a, selling black-market cigarettes so that her extended family can pay smugglers to take them across the Mediterranean on a dinghy. But as they hear stories of more and more people drowning, her father Tarek is no longer sure if he can risk his children's lives... Meanwhile, 27-year-old Hassan, who is fleeing imprisonment and torture in his native Damascus, is desperate to make the crossing at all costs. He puts his life, and those of his travelling companions, in the hands of smugglers and boards a dinghy. As the overcrowded boat begins to take on water, the passengers face a life-and-death decision. In Syria, we film 24-year-old Anas as he prepares to leave the shattered city of Aleppo, with snipers firing at his departing taxi as he heads towards the Turkish border. And we meet Ahmad who, having left his wife and young family behind, is racing to get to Britain so he can get them out of their besieged town in Syria. But he's stalled on Kos as the Greek island is overwhelmed and the authorities struggle to cope.

Ahmad's journey continues in this second episode. A Syrian Kurd, he has reached Athens, and rather than take the long and uncertain overland route through Europe, he negotiates with a smuggler for a fake passport that he can use to fly to France. With his wife and young daughters trapped in Syria, time is of the essence. In Calais, his first attempt to cross the Channel almost results in suffocation in a flour tanker. But he refuses to give up on Britain. Also leaving Athens is 24-year-old Sadiq from Afghanistan, fleeing Taliban repression and violence and heading to Finland - a country of which he's never even seen a picture. Meanwhile, 11-year-old Isra'a and her family group of 16 people, including babies and her severely disabled sister, are approaching the Serbian border. They are shocked by the total chaos that greets them and are forced to spend hours in the mud and pouring rain with no certainty that they will be able to continue their journey to Germany.

21-year-old Alaigie is preparing to leave Gambia to travel 'the back way' 6,000 kilometres to Italy to find work. Following his father's death, Alaigie's dreams of becoming an engineer were shattered, and he needs to earn money to support his family. He films the dangerous journey through Africa via a network of smugglers, at the mercy of thieves and violent border guards, across the Sahara in overloaded trucks to Tripoli. But instead of getting on a boat as he had expected, Alaigie is kidnapped and a ransom is demanded. His family in Gambia struggle to raise the money to pay. Meanwhile, Syrian Kurd Ahmad's attempt to be smuggled into Britain in the back of a lorry finally pays off, and he's sent to Wakefield while his asylum claim is processed. He's desperate to get leave to remain so that he can bring his wife and young daughters out of Syria. With their home town under attack from Daesh (so-called Islamic State) and the Assad regime, the clock is ticking for him to get them to safety. And 27-year-old Hassan, who survived the sinking of his dinghy in the Mediterranean, has reached Calais and the infamous Jungle. But every attempt to board a train or lorry is thwarted, and his spirits fall as he sees his friends succeed in crossing the Channel. In desperation he tries to fly to the UK on a fake Czech passport, but the final few miles prove the hardest to travel.