Thread: SPECIAL REPORT: Border Tunnels

11.20.07
SPECIAL REPORT: Border Tunnels


By Ken Molestina, ABC 7

SPECIAL REPORT -- With border security tightening, illegal immigrants are finding different ways to break into the United States, including one risky passage ... coming across though tunnels. Hundreds have entered through El Paso's drainage tunnels just this year.

They enter near the border canals, and they let smugglers lead them through the dark labyrinth of underground tunnels that run all the way to Central El Paso.

As security technology improves and the U.S. Border Patrol beefs up its operations, simply crossing the Rio Grande and running into the U.S. is no longer feasible for many undocumented immigrants seeking a better life in a new land.

Instead, a web of undeground drainage tunnels is becoming the illegal entrance of choice of many migrants, and their human smugglers. But life-threatening risks lie within the tunnels, like poisonous insects and confined spaces without air.

Ignoring these risks has sometimes proved to be fatal.

"One man got lost venturing through it." said Ramiro Cordero, an agent with the Border Patrol. "He thought he could fit through one of the tunnels and he actually suffocated. He got stuck in the drainage tunnel."

ABC 7 decided to go underground and see it first hand.

In one tunnel our team found a black widow spider; in another, hundreds of webs and unsanitary matter including slime, and what appeared to be decomposing waste.

Authorities admit the smugglers sometimes know the web of tunnels better than they do.

"The smuggler doesn't care. He's going to run. As soon as he knows we are on his trail he's going to keep running and he knows these tunnels, very very well," Cordero said.

ABC 7 found one tunnel so small, that one can't even stand upright. It's difficult for someone to put one's hands out to the side. The prospect of absolute darkness provides another element of danger.

But those factors are even more numerous.

Earlier this year, a tunnel incursion resulted in a standoff when immigrants allegedly attacked a Border Patrol agent chasing them. The agent shot and wounded the migrant.

In another case, more than a dozen migrants were spotted going into a tunnel. After poring through maps of the winding network, firefighters went in. But the group was never found.

As the number of illegal entries through tunnels continues to rise, the alarming trend has forced the El Paso rescuers to train in specialized tunnel manuevers. This month, a team of about a dozen firefighters specially trained in confined rescues had a simulation exercise to sharpen their skills.

Fire officials say because these entries are becoming more common they have to be well prepared. They use air tanks, ropes, and the support of the entire team, but they contend the work is extremely dangerous.

"I'm trained to do so, and I still get a little unnerved going down there," said Lt. Jake Tausiani, of the El Paso Fire Department. "Somebody running from Border Patrol they might have different motives than I do."

"There are legal ways to come into the U.S. and that is not one of them, especially with the dangers involved behind it." Cordero said.

http://www.kvia.com/Global/story.asp?S=7391204&nav=AbC0

When I read about these people coming over hear when they have heard that we are cracking down, they deserve what they get. I am sick of the sob stories.

Why not close off the end of these tunnels with very heavy iron grills that could be welded on at our end, if they can't get out they won't go in! Or is there some complication I don't know about? Seems a simple thing to do.

Seems to me that if they've got the guts to travel through these dangers, they would have the guts to stand up to their government and demand change. I have a hard time feeling sorry for these people.

badbettyboop wrote:

Why not close off the end of these tunnels with very heavy iron grills that could be welded on at our end, if they can't get out they won't go in!

That's exactly what I was thinking. Also, why can't we place motion sensors in the tunnels? In the case of manhole covers we could lock the lids into place with a locking steel bar device attached to the outside of the cover.

It seems the obvious answer of closing the tunnels as mentioned above seem to escape our politicians. I mean it seems obvious even when you see the ILLEGALS climing fences or going under a fence or cutting a fence. One would think with all our technology that, A) there must be a fence that cannot be cut or scaled or dug under, and B) there can be gate-like iron rods placed over tunnels.

And as far as them suffering, if they don't break our LAWS, they wouldn't have to 'suffer'. I'm sorry but I don't feel pity for them. They have a country and if they want change in their country they need to, as a people, make the change.

If citizens in the US, way back, did not make the changes, we'd be under British rule.