46 found dead in Texas tractor-trailer; 16 hospitalized

Texas: At least 46 migrants have been found dead inside a tractor-trailer in San Antonio, Texas— in an apparent attempt of human smuggling along the United States-Mexico border.  

According to details, 16 other people found in the trailer were transported to the hospital for heat stroke and exhaustion. They included four minors.

“The patients we saw were hot to the touch. They were suffering from heat stroke, heat exhaustion. There were no signs of water in the vehicle,” said an official, adding that the vehicle was a refrigerated tractor-trailer, but there was no visible air conditioning unit on that rig. 

Police Chief William McManus said a city worker at the scene was alerted to the situation by a cry for help shortly before 6 pm on Monday (23:00 GMT). Officers arrived to find a body on the ground outside the trailer and a partially opened gate to the trailer. 

The vehicle was found next to railway tracks in a remote area on the city’s southern outskirts, and McManus said three people were taken into custody over the incident.

Mexico’s Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard called the suffocation of the refugees and migrants a “tragedy in Texas” and said the local consulate was en route to the scene.

The tragic incident may be one of the deadliest incidents of human smuggling along the US-Mexico border in recent decades. 

In 2017, ten people died after being trapped inside a truck that was parked at a Walmart in San Antonio, while in 2003, nineteen people were found dead in a sweltering truck southeast of the city.