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By Annie Rose Ramos and Gabe Gutierrez
DONNA, Texas – The dirt roads in the Lower Rio Grande Valley Wildlife Sanctuary National Wildlife Area are right on the river, while the brushwood is shrinking as far as the eye can see on the dry, cracked earth.
Each road has exactly the same aspect, which explains in part why Fabiola Peña and her two sons have been running around for hours.
The mother did not understand that she had entered the United States before border patrol agents found her with six other Guatemalans who had just crossed the border.
"My son, we are in the United States," Peña told his eldest son in Spanish. Weeping, the two men were delighted as she told her sons that they would not be forced to return to their country.
Border officer Hermann Rivera did not have time to stop for Peña and the others. He gave them bottles of water, made sure they did not have any urgent health problems and told them to head west on another dirt track so they would not are lost more.
Then it was in the car for Rivera, for the next group of families.
A border patrol station visited by NBC News was to have a capacity of about 380 migrants crossing the border, but had more than 1,200.
Two new camps
On Thursday, federal authorities opened two large "modular facilities" – essentially tent cities – one in El Paso and the other in Donna near McAllen.
John Morris, acting deputy chief patrol officer in the Rio Grande Valley area of the Border Patrol, described them as "bandages" to help them cope with dramatic overcapacity in other federal facilities.
"The McAllen treatment center is full," Morris said. He added that the McAllen Border Patrol Station was also full. "I have 1,200 people in a facility for 384 people."
Morris said they saw only between 1,200 and 1,500 migrants a day on this part of the border.
Morris said his sector was "overwhelmed" by the response to the largest influx of migrants in more than a decade. They are mainly families and unaccompanied minors, and they do not flee the border patrol agents. In fact, they are looking for them.
"The smuggler will tell them to walk and follow this road until you see a green-and-white vehicle, an officer dressed in green, and tell them you're here to go," Morris said.
Each of the two tents that open in El Paso and Donna can accommodate up to 500 migrants, mostly families or unaccompanied children, for up to 72 hours. From there, adults and their children will be entrusted with the application of the law on immigration and customs, while unaccompanied children will be taken in charge by the Office of Refugee Resettlement. .
NBC News visited Donna's new facility, divided into four air-conditioned, 8,000-square-foot modules. Each basket will accommodate up to 125 people sleeping on mats and with plastic separations offering some privacy. There are small guard towers that will be made up of security personnel.
Inside the Border Patrol Station, 700 migrants were in a concrete "outlet port" – essentially a garage – outside the station building as there was no room left for the station. inside. People were split into two large groups by steel fences.
Inside the station, between the detention cells, layers were stacked on tables against the wall. Formula and baby bottles sat next to the water jugs. Mothers lined up, holding their babies in waiting for baby wipes.
According to Morris, smugglers tell Central American migrants that if they arrive with a child, they will not be separated and will be allowed to stay in the United States.
"It's a border security crisis and a political crisis," Morris said. "The child is now known as the ticket. If you are crossing with a child, you will only be detained for 20 days, which the smugglers will of course use. So we see children being recycled. "
Deadly reminder
Wednesday, a raft carrying nine people capsized on the Rio Grande, according to customs and border patrol. A 10-month-old child was found dead and three other people – two boys aged 6 and 7 and one man – went missing.
Border patrol officers began a search and rescue mission after a man arrested for illegally crossing the border told them that his wife and two children were missing in the river after their capsize. raft.
The officers found the man's wife and eldest son, a six-year-old boy who was asking for help from the river and struggling to stay afloat but alive. The officers then found the son of this man from 10 months to several kilometers downstream, deceased.
The incident is another reminder of the big stakes for migrants at the border.
"We are facing a senseless tragedy," said Raul L. Ortiz, chief patrol officer for the Del Rio sector of the Customs and Border Protection Directorate.
Nonstop
Kenny, 19, who does not want to use his full name, has been looking for Border Patrol agents to help him with his 1 year old daughter, Jacel Michele.
The toddler had struggled with fever in recent weeks since traveling from Honduras to the United States.
"Her fever worsens the night," she said. They had walked for hours on the winding dirt roads of the shelter and Kenny could feel the fever of his daughter getting worse.
When officer Rivera found the mother, he gave her some water that she quickly poured over Jacel Michele's head.
The girl burst out laughing as the water poured her green shirt with "Virgen de Suyapa" engraved for "Our Lady of Suyapa", the patron saint of Honduras.
Holding Jacel Michele and a plastic bag full of diapers, Kenny said she had no choice but to leave her home country where there was no job to support her and to those of his daughter.
Once again, Rivera could not stay. He had heard of another group of migrant "families" wandering the dirt roads by more than 90 degrees.
According to CBP, the area of the Rio Grande Valley is the busiest place in the country for the apprehension of families and unaccompanied children.
Rivera told Kenny's group to wait in the shadows and ask other agents to pick them up in vans.
"It's like that all day," he said. "Nonstop."
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