Sky News has witnessed the increasing levels of lawlessness in pockets of northern France as authorities struggle to contain the violence committed by some of the migrants and refugees in the area, writes Sky News Europe correspondent Mark Stone.
Shortly before 11pm on Thursday night, three colleagues and I were attacked by a group of between 20 and 25 men.
It is the latest example of how small violent elements of the huge migrant population living in the "Jungle" camp and other new settlements are roaming lawlessly.
Sky producer Andy Marsh, cameraman Richie Mockler, a security consultant and I had arrived at the northbound Shell service station on the E15 near the village of Norrent-Fontes.
We had been prompted to investigate migrant activity at the service station after spending a few hours the previous day at a new migrant camp that has popped up nearby.
Since the French government announced that it would demolish the Calais jungle camp by the end of the year, there has been evidence of new camps appearing elsewhere in the countryside of northern France.
The Norrent-Fontes camp numbered a few dozen until a few months ago. New estimates now suggest that it's home for more than 300 Eritreans, Ethiopians and Sudanese.
We had spent a few hours on Wednesday in the Norrent-Fontes camp and didn't feel at all threatened.
We spoke to many of those living there who were friendly and welcoming. Most were happy to be interviewed on camera and explained how war and political oppression had pushed them from their homes.
hey also pointed out why they had settled in this new camp - its proximity to the service station makes it the perfect point from which to try to sneak onto lorries to the UK.
We moved up to the service station and found a ditch next to the truck stop with blankets, empty bottles and other litter.
It was clear to us that the migrants wait here at night and then try to board the lorries parked a few yards away. We wanted to see and record this happening.
The following evening we returned to the service station, parked on the garage forecourt and walked over to the ditch area, filming as we walked.
As we reached the ditch area, we heard voices and were then approached out of the darkness by three men, all clearly migrants.
One asked, in broken English, what we were doing there. Extending my hand, I explained that we were journalists and wanted to see what they were doing.
The man then moved back towards the ditch. We moved forward and looked over the fence into the ditch, where 20 or 25 men were crouching. They moved up and began to chase us, lobbing rocks.
We ran back towards the forecourt and reunited with producer Andy Marsh who was with the car.
The group stopped chasing us and we thought we were safe.