Most migrants who escaped abandoned truck in Mexico from Guatemala, officials say

July 29 (UPI) -- At least 94 migrants escaped from a semi-truck trailer that was abandoned ahead of a checkpoint on the Acayucan-Sayula Highway in Veracruz, Mexico. The migrants were starting to feel suffocated and forced their way out of the truck trailer to escape.

According to the Guatemalan Foreign Ministry, 89 of the migrants were Guatemalan nationals. Fifty-five were adults and the rest were family groups and unaccompanied children.

The ministry said in a statement that the migrants were transported in the truck the night of July 27. It said all the Guatemalan migrants were "fine, with the exception of three who hurt their ankles getting off the truck."

The ministry said they were notified about the migrants by the Mexican National Migration Institute and the Guatemalan Consular Mission went to the immigration station in Mexico to interview the nationals involved.

According to BBC News, civil protection paramedic Cristobal Cisneros Valencia said the migrants began to feel suffocated and they broke through the roof of the truck and jumped out. The truck was headed for the U.S. border.

Dozens of migrants died in June in Texas in similar circumstances when a tractor-trailor carrying them was abandoned in sweltering heat by the side of a road. Forty-eight people were found dead inside and five more died after being taken to a hospital.