This is ‘The Beast’ leading thousands of desperate migrants to the US-Mexico border.

Thousands of migrants are forced to take the dangerous routes traveling aboard cargo trains to advance towards the north of Mexico, in a race against time to reach the border with the United States before the end of a harsh immigration policy that prevented them from ask for asylum

In recent weeks, groups of hundreds of migrants have boarded the train, known as “The beast”, according to testimonies from activists and officials. Many set out on the long journey on carriages that climbed quickly when the train made a brief stop at a station next to a garbage dump in Huehuetoca, north of Mexico City.

The rush has intensified as news circulated Thursday night of the end of Title 42, a coronavirus pandemic-era policy that took effect in March 2020 that has allowed the United States to quickly expel thousands of migrants to Mexico.

US officials have said they expect a spike in border crossings when it happens, increasing pressure from authorities already grappling with record levels of illegal entries.

Many migrants want to get to the border as soon as possible, although they are not sure what the new rules will be. Washington has said it will end the regulation that will deny asylum to many.

“If it’s easier, I doubt it”, said Romario Solano, a 23-year-old Venezuelan who had waited for hours under the intense rays of the sun for the arrival of the train on the tracks littered with garbage in Huehuetoca. “We know that as migration has increased further, strong measures have been taken.”.

Solano acknowledged that traveling by train was dangerous, but said she did not have the money to pay for the bus ticket.

For years, thousands of migrants, mainly Central Americans, have traversed Mexico on a network of freight trains known as “the beast” because the noise of the railway resembles a roar.

Although it allows them to avoid dozens of detention centers and checkpoints, the risk of boarding the train is high, and injuries, mutilation of limbs and even death often result when migrants fall from the carriages.

The latest wave of people who boarded”the beastThey were mostly poor Venezuelans, according to authorities and activists, including families with young children seeking to reach mainly Ciudad Juárez, which borders El Paso, Texas.

Many climb narrow ladders to sit on rooftops, others huddle inside empty railcars and spread blankets over gravel, steel bars and other building materials that travel in the railcars in the open.

“There are hundreds of migrants arriving daily, looking to get on the train”, said the activist Guadalupe González. Just last week, she explained, hundreds were waiting for a train in the central city of Irapuato, in the violent state of Guanajuato.

“We had not seen so many migrants pass through here in these conditions”, he added after mentioning that last month up to 700 people tried to board in a single day.

Waiting for the train

Sitting on a log near the Huehuetoca garbage dump, Venezuelan migrant Allender Ruy reproduced voice messages from a friend warning him about the multi-day journey.

“Of course, brother, when you catch the train, wrap up well, because on that train it is very cold, but terrible, terrible, terrible”, his friend told him in the telephone audio.

After being deported to Venezuela from Panama when he first tried to reach the United States earlier this year, Ruy was hoping for a second chance.

“I have to arrive, at the latest, before the 11th (May)“, he claimed.

On the broken screen of his smartphone, his Venezuelan compatriot Franklin Cuervas watched a Tik Tok video subtitled “the border hardens.”

Two of his brothers, already in the United States, wanted him to cross the border before May 11 to avoid the crowd of migrants arriving. “They say that it is better before, because the people come stronger, the people will want to enter”.