And violent storm of snow and wind left 400 people stranded – many without water and without food – in the Andes Mountains, at 3200 meters high above sea level in the area of the Los Libertadores border crossing, better known as Christ the Redeemerwhich connects the province of Mendoza with Chile.
While it is estimated that the temperature in the high mountains is less than -10° degrees, the evacuation tasks of the stranded are complicated by the persistence of unfavorable weather conditions, which also They prevent the removal of the 300 vehicles detained there, including trucks, private cars and long-distance buses.
The problem at the intersection started on Saturday. Edward Yayathe transportation coordinator at the Cristo Redentor pass, explained that the speed of border control is “very slow” for the exhaustive revisions that are made and detailed that yesterday, when the limit was open between 9 and 13, The storm surprised at noon and the route was cut off due to bad weather.
“This produces an accumulation of vehicles of all kinds: freight transport, international and internal tourism, and passengers. And in a situation storm with white wind generates deficiencies in the road work because the number of vehicles was not anticipated. While the traffic is stopped, the snowfall advances, and the traffic ends up collapsed and stranded in the high mountains”, explained this man in dialogue with TN.
Also, to describe the harsh circumstances that are experienced in the high mountains due to the complaints of the stranded -among whom there are also babies-, he specified that this morning between five and eight degrees below zero temperature, but that the situation is even more complex inside the shots. “When you are in a vehicle, with the white wind that is in the place, the thermal sensation exceeds 15 degrees below zero”, raised.
“They are in really complicated situations”, said Yaya, who despite the fact that the Mendoza media spoke of 400 people immobilized in the high mountains, he mentioned 300. “They have been evacuated by the authorities since yesterday at 18, but they still haven’t finished with everyone”admitted the coordinator, who added: “More than 50 or 60 people have been evacuated throughout the night and there are still two or three buses left.”
Meanwhile, he has already confirmed that despite the rescue of part of the people detained at the border crossing, the vehicles will stay there until the storm subsides, something that is supposed to happen tomorrow. With the crisis committee already formed, circulation on the border is limited only to National Highway and Gendarmerie vehicles, in addition to an Army unit in the Puente del Inca area. The pass will be closed until tomorrow because more snowfall is expected.
Yaya also maintained that there are 50 trucks stopped in both directions on the Argentine side and 150 in Chile, a country where a total of 250 vehicles are waiting to circulate, according to the newspaper The Andes.
Ximena Marquez was detained at the Cristo Redentor pass with her two daughters, aged three and six, when he passed the Chilean zone and intended to enter Argentina, yesterday at 3:30 p.m. “We are stranded with cold and with the girls in the car, with everything that implies. We stayed here with a bunch of other cars, with passenger transport, cargo trucks, some without a chain. They let us pass and they did not guarantee that those who passed were prepared for what was to come, crazy, totally wrong, we don’t know how we’re going to get out”, said this woman in TN.
He expressed, luckily, having had food in the car, since he remarked that the Gendarmerie only arrived after 11 p.m. to provide them with food. “At dawn they came to tell us that they were going to offer to evacuate our car, if we wanted, because it is without fuel and that implies that it is without heating. with 8 degrees below zero, it’s not comfortable at all. They came to offer to evacuate us, to see if we wanted to go to Uspallata, but they didn’t finish defining what it means to go: Do we have to leave the car with all our things? Even when? There is a lack of information to make a decision, we do not know what it means to go to Uspallata“, She complained.
At the time of describing the situation, he reported that at the international border there are “a caravan standing in a pile of snow” and revealed: “I am in contact with two other Argentine expatriate families in Chile, we are in the same one, with some 500 meters away and others, 150 meters away. Some with babies on board. They are both without fuel, cold, without food, trying to evacuate without knowing what it means to evacuate.”.
Around 11 o’clock this Sunday, on the official Twitter of the Cristo Redentor pass they reported: “Regarding the situation of the people stranded in their private vehicles and truck drivers in the area of the Curva de La Soberanía and Las Cuevas: the evacuation of the people to the Caves, the Puente de Inca Hunters Company and the Uspallata Hospital as a shelter”.
They also specified that the brigades acted throughout the night and This is how they rescued 117 people. “Personnel from the High Mountain Rescue Patrol inspected more than 100 vehicles, verifying the condition of their occupants. National Highway continues with the work of road cleaning and with the removal of the trucks that obstructed the road. All this in an attempt to make a trace to get stuck vehicles out as soon as possible”, they limited.
Personnel from the National Highway Administration, the Gendarmerie, the Argentine Army, the Mendoza Police, the Rescue Patrol, the Chrabalowski Hospital, the Ministry of Social Action, the Municipality of Heras and Provincial Civil Defense are working to solve the situation. .