VOA Immigration Reporter Ramon Taylor contributed to this report.
EAGLE PASS and SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS — Along the Pan-American Highway in Colombia’s Cauca Department, Juan Guillermo Sicilia Álvarez fell unconscious the morning of Jan. 4, surrounded by other migrants traveling on the transcontinental thoroughfare.
He was the first migrant to die in the Americas this year, according to data compiled by the International Organization for Migration’s Missing Migrants Project. Local media reported he was 30 years old and from Venezuela.
Migrant fatalities happen in the Western Hemisphere from the southwestern U.S. to the Caribbean Sea to Central and South America. Boats capsize and river-crossers are swept away by currents. People get lost or abandoned in the desert without water. Disease and health emergencies strike. Cars crash. Trains crush hangers-on. Fingers pull gun triggers.
By the end of August, more than 520 migrants in the Americas died or went missing and are presumed dead, making 2019 the deadliest year for migrants in five years.
Deadly border
Half of the deaths documented in the Americas this year occurred near the U.S.-Mexico border, where bodies or skeletons are regularly found in the desert. U.S. agents patrolling the Rio Grande frequently search the river for missing children or entire families swept under the current while trying to swim across and reach U.S. soil.
