At least 46 people have been found dead inside a truck in Texas, state Gov. Greg Abbott has confirmed.
Citing a source close to the investigation, WOAI TV of San Antonio said the dead were believed to be migrants and that the truck was found next to the railroad tracks in the city’s Southwest Side neighborhood.
Firefighters confirmed that 16 more people, including four children, were taken to hospital and are “hoping to survive.”
At a press conference, San Antonio fire chief Charles Hood said the truck was refrigerated but there was no functional water or air conditioning, adding that patients were hot to the touch and suffering from heat exhaustion.
“We’re not supposed to open a truck and see piles of bodies. No one comes to work for that,” he said.
There are no children among the dead, the official confirmed.
San Antonio Police Chief William McManus has confirmed that three people are in custody and a federal investigation has been opened.
He added that this was the largest such incident in the city.
Abbott, a Republican politician, tweeted that “these deaths are in Biden,” adding, “They are the result of his deadly open-border policies.”
Image: Police block the scene where a semi-trailer with multiple bodies was discovered, Monday, June 27, 2022 in San Antonio. (Photo by AP / Eric Gay)
San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg said this “is nothing more and nothing less than a human tragedy,” adding, “Our job is not to ask why. Our job is to ask how we can help.”
Mexico’s Secretary of Foreign Affairs Marcel Ebrard said a consul was heading to the neighborhood and that at least two of those hospitalized were from Guatemala.
“Tragedy in Texas. He seems to have drowned in the trailer box,” he wrote on Twitter.
“The trailer has EU plates, superimposed, to circulate without revision. Most likely the authorship of the traffickers.”
Archbishop Gustav, a Catholic priest of St. Anthony, lamented the tragedy so soon after the shooting of Uvalde, writing on Twitter: “Lord, have mercy on them. They expected a better life. Lord after Uvalde and now that, help us! We need you.! So many people who suffer. God, God, God. “
Although no official cause of death has been reported, temperatures in San Antonio, about 160 miles (250 km) from the Mexican border, reached a high of 103 F on Monday (39, 4 C) with high humidity.