At least four migrants, allegedly Venezuelan, died this Sunday and about twenty were injured after the bus they were traveling in plunged into an abyss in northwestern Honduras, firefighters reported.
The Fire Department reported that “a serious bus accident in Santa Rosa de Copán,” 250 km northwest of Tegucigalpa, involving Venezuelan citizens […] has left several people trapped and unfortunately has claimed human lives.”
“A team of firefighters has been working tirelessly on rescue efforts and caring for the injured,” it added in a statement without giving figures for the dead and injured.
After the fall, part of the bus was left underwater in the Higuito River, at the bottom of the precipice. Firefighter Jimmy Orellana, who participated in the rescue, initially reported to the local HRN station two deaths.
His colleague Javier Perdomo said minutes later that “with the help of a crane, the bus was located in a better position to enter and remove the last two bodies.” “Regrettable what happened: four people dead,” Perdomo indicated.
Orellana detailed that six injured were taken in two ambulances to the Occidente Hospital in Santa Rosa de Copán, and there were “15 people with considerable injuries, but who refused to be transferred to a hospital.”
One of the two bus drivers, Leonel Girón, recounted that he was driving but handed over the relay to his colleague due to tiredness. “I only felt when I was in the water,” he lamented.
A Venezuelan who identified herself as Indira Barroso said they left Tegucigalpa on the bus at six in the afternoon on Saturday towards Aguas Calientes (north), border with Guatemala, with some 70 passengers, including Venezuelans, Colombians, Haitians and other nationalities.
“The bus was already presenting mechanical failures […] we fell into the river, into the precipice,” she told the same radio station. More than 400,000 migrants of different nationalities crossed Honduras this year bound for the United States in search of better opportunities, according to the migration authorities.
Migrants enter through blind spots on the border with Nicaragua and continue their journey to the border with Guatemala.
