Authorities still don’t know why the SUV was packed with 25 people early in the morning. It is not clear where they were going. And, ultimately, what caused the semi-truck to crash into the side of the Ford Expedition at an intersection on a country road, 10 miles north of the Mexican border.
“It would be premature on my part to speculate about what happened in this collision. The important thing is that 13 people died in this accident,” said Omar Watson, head of the California Highway Patrol Border Division. “We owe the families of those who were killed and injured, as well as the public, to carry out a thorough and thorough investigation.”
But after a day of combing the consequences of the knife hitting the semitruck against the left side of the SUV, here’s what we know:
Hospital and police officials provided slightly different counts of those injured and killed in the incident.
Judy Cruz, managing director of the emergency department at El Centro Regional Medical Center, said the vehicle had 28 occupants and 15 died.
But Watson said at a morning news conference that there were 25 occupants on the expedition and that 13 died, including the SUV driver. The SUV’s passengers were between 15 and 53 years old, he said.
It is not yet known where all the passengers in the SUV came from, since some had no identification, said Watson, although he added that the driver was from the Mexican city of Mexicali.
“We are close to the border, so we have people who come and go daily to work,” he said.
And the Consulate of Mexico said that at least 10 of the victims were Mexican citizens.
Consulate officials said they were saddened by the news and are working to confirm the nationalities of the other three passengers.
The 69-year-old semi-trailer driver suffered moderate injuries. The trailers he was pulling were not loaded, Watson said.
What happened
According to the authorities, the police received a call about the accident at about 6:15 am. At the time of the accident, the semitruck was traveling north on State Road 115 and the expedition was traveling west on Norrish Road in the Holtville area, approximately 160 east of San Diego, said Watson.
The semi-truck was traveling at an unknown speed when it hit the left side of the SUV.
Watson said it is not clear whether the SUV stopped at an intersection, but entered the intersection “in front of the big rig”.
“I don’t know if they were cut or removed, I’m not sure, but they weren’t in the vehicle,” said Watson. “What this indicates is that there were not enough seat belts for passengers.”
The scene was horrific, with some occupants ejected from the vehicle and killed, while others were found dead inside the SUV, Watson said. He said 12 people died at the crash site and one person died in a hospital.
What comes next in the investigation
The injured occupants were taken to El Centro Regional Medical Center (ECRMC), Desert Regional Medical Center in Palm Springs and the Pioneers Memorial Hospital near Brawley. UC San Diego Health said it received three patients transferred from the ECRMC by air ambulance.
Three of the four patients being treated at Desert Regional Medical Center were in the intensive care unit, the hospital’s director of communications, Todd Burke, told CNN.
At least one of the SUV’s injured passengers was discharged from the hospital, Watson said.
US officials are now working with the Mexican Consulate to determine who was in the SUV and to notify their family members.
Special agents from the Homeland Security Investigations office in San Diego are investigating whether smuggling of people was involved, a spokeswoman for the United States Department of Immigration and Customs told CNN in a statement.
The National Transportation Safety Board also said it would investigate the accident.
“The NTSB, in conjunction with the CHP, is conducting a safety investigation of Tuesday’s fatal accident involving an SUV and a truck near Holtville, California,” said the statement via Twitter.
“The investigator responsible for the NTSB is due to arrive on Wednesday, and later they will be accompanied by two other investigators.”
CNN’s Konstantin Toropin, Stella Chan, Alexandra Meeks, Steve Almasy, Priscilla Alvarez, Jaqueline Hurtado and Paul P. Murphy contributed to this report.