At least 13 people were killed on Tuesday when a maroon Ford Expedition crammed with 25 adults and children was slammed by a tractor-trailer near the US-Mexico border, officials said.
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HOLTVILLE, Calif. (Reuters) - At least 13 people, 10 of them Mexican nationals, were killed on Tuesday when a tractor-trailer slammed into an SUV crammed with 25 adults and children on a dusty Southern Californian road near the U.S.-Mexico border, officials said.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents opened an investigation into whether human smuggling was involved, an agency spokeswoman said in a statement hours later.
Handmade wooden crosses stretched in a line across a patch of dry grass and dirt by the roadside, and a seat covered in what appeared to be blood lay near the crumpled Ford Expedition, as the desolate highway through the farming community of Holtville remained closed Tuesday afternoon.
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IMPERIAL COUNTY, Calif. At least 13 people were confirmed dead Tuesday at the scene of a collision involving an SUV and a semi-truck in Imperial County, California. The mass casualty occurred near the intersection of Highway 115 at Norrish Road in the small town of Holtville, KESQ reported. The crash site is about 125 miles east of San Diego.
The El Centro Regional Medical Center said during a Tuesday news conference that there were 28 passengers inside an “SUV” that struck a semi-truck full of gravel. Four people were flown out from the scene via helicopter to Desert Regional Medical Center, and seven people were transported to El Centro Regional Medical Center, one of whom died after arrival, officials said.
Authorities said they are still unsure what brought the SUV into the path of the truck and why so many people were inside of it.
Watson, who heads the agency’s border division, said the scene was “chaotic” when fire crews and law enforcement agents arrived about 10 minutes after the crash; it was not expected to be cleared until late evening because of the ongoing investigation. By late afternoon, the CHP was still working with the coroner’s office to identify passengers.
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At least 10 of the dead were Mexican nationals, said Roberto Velasco Álvarez, who heads the North America Department for the Mexican foreign ministry.
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