Details emerge in San Fernando bus hijackings, rescue

Sources close to The Monitor have provided new information regarding the kidnapping and rescue of not three but four passenger buses on the highways of Tamaulipas. Their rescue Saturday was not only due to Mexican authorities but to a small group of civilians who tracked down the buses and alerted authorities.

A day after the bus hijackings — three of which took place some 80 miles south of Brownsville in the San Fernando, Tamps., area — authorities have yet to release official information regarding the case.

The kidnappings came just one day after the Tamaulipas Secretary of State Morelos Canseco Gomez made a public announcement promoting tourism, claiming the highways are safe.

Three of the buses were hijacked in the Las Norias area, just outside San Fernando, said a source outside law enforcement with direct knowledge of the situation.

The three buses were traveling from Reynosa and Matamoros, heading south to Puebla state and other destinations, the source said. The vehicles belonged to Transpais, ADO and Futura bus lines, and each was carrying a considerable number of passengers, the source said.

The buses were taken at gunpoint down almost to the town of Soto la Marina, Tamps., some 180 miles from Brownsville. There, a fourth bus — from Transpais — had been hijacked.

Details remain sketchy, but the buses were taken through dirt roads into a brushy area to avoid patrols by Mexican authorities. After three hours of being held hostage, a group of passengers aided by one of the bus drivers made a run for it into the brush.

One of those passengers used a cell phone to call for a family friend, who contacted the Mexican Navy, the Mexican Highway Patrol and the Mexican Army, which mounted a search-and-rescue operation, the source said.

GPS devices installed in the buses were used to track their location to a dirt road off the 168-kilometer marker of the Matamoros–Soto La Marina highway.

When authorities arrived in the area, the gunmen fled, leaving the panicked passengers behind, the source said. Authorities found one Transpais bus had been parked so as to block the road, and its tires had been shot.

After locating the rest of the passengers and helping make the buses road-worthy again, authorities escorted the passengers to the coastal city of Tampico, Tamps., where they were cared for.

The city of San Fernando is the same location where in late March and early April, Mexican federal authorities found a large number of mass graves — filled with the bodies of kidnapped bus passengers. The body count from those clandestine graves has reached more than 190.

According to Mexico’s Attorney General’s Office, the murders were carried out by Zetas who were seeking to intercept members of the Gulf Cartel and their allies who were traveling through the area.

San Fernando is also known for a previous massacre in the summer of 2010 when authorities found the bodies of 72 migrants — allegedly killed by the Zetas — inside a warehouse.