CEUTA, Spain — Authorities in Ceuta asked the government in Madrid to declare a national emergency and requested army intervention, as thousands crossed into the tiny Spanish territory.

Videos shot at Tarajal beach showed crowds of people, mainly Moroccans, walking around the breakwaters and running on the beach and roads. While the majority appear to be young men, there were also families with women and children. “Viva España!” some shouted to a freelance photographer working for The Associated Press filming the scene.

The escalation at the border between Spain and Morocco comes after a surge in migrants attempting to reach the small exclave, mainly by swimming.

The scenes of people streaming across the frontier recall the border crisis of May 2021 when more than 8,000 migrants poured into Ceuta in just two days.

Juan Jesús Vivas, head of the Ceuta regional government, called for the national government in Madrid to declare a national emergency on grounds of national security, asking for more police and for the army to be deployed on the border.

Vivas said the additional police and soldiers would be necessary “to guarantee the inviolability of the frontier and citizen safety.”

He had warned on Wednesday that migrant reception centers were overwhelmed with hundreds of people sleeping on the streets.