Over 40 migrants die in San Antonio, others are hospitalised

SAN ANTONIO: Firefighters in San Antonio, Texas, discovered the bodies of 46 migrants inside a tractor-trailer on Monday, according to the city’s fire department. This looks to be one of the most lethal recent episodes of human smuggling along the US-Mexico border.

Four juveniles were among the 16 persons found inside the trailer who was sent to the hospital with heat exhaustion and heat stroke, according to the San Antonio Fire Department. Three people have been arrested because of the incident, officials said.

It was located along train tracks in a rural place on the outskirts of the city.

It was not yet known what country the victims were from, but Mexico’s Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard claimed on Twitter that they had been suffocating in a vehicle, calling it a “tragedy in Texas.” He also added that the local embassy was on its way to the scene.

President Joe Biden, a Democrat, has faced criticism for his immigration policy as record numbers of migrants have crossed the US-Mexico border recently.

It was 39.4 degrees Celsius in San Antonio, around 160 miles (250 kilometres) from the Mexican border, when temperatures soared to 103 degrees Fahrenheit.

There were ten migrants who lost their lives in a tractor-trailer that was discovered by authorities in San Antonio’s Wal-Mart parking lot in July of last year. The next year, the driver, James Matthew Bradley, Jr., was convicted of his involvement in the smuggling operation and sentenced to life in prison.