<div id="attachment_94457" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width:310px;"><a rel="nofollow" class="highslide" target="_blank" href="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0003.jpg"><img class="size-medium wp-image-94457" title="Marcelo Aguilar" src="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0003-300x225.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="225"/></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Marcelo Aguilar</p></div>
<p><strong style="font-size:13px;">But while the Fuller family has every good reason to celebrate, a family up north is grieving the loss of one of their own. On Wednesday night, there was a three-car pile-up involving a ten wheeler truck, a minivan and a pick-up truck in a dark stretch of the highway, not far from the northern border in Santa Elena. The driver of the minivan, Marcelo Aguilar, was thrown out of his vehicle and died on the spot while five other passengers in the two other vehicles sustained varying degrees of injuries. Indications are that speeding was a factor in the collision and police are also conducting alcohol testing. News Five’s Isani Cayetano reports.</strong></p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>Isani Cayetano, Reporting</strong></p>
<p>The mangled remains of this grey Toyota minivan, driven at the time by twenty-eight-year-old Marcelo Aguilar, was towed to Concepcion Village this morning. Its considerably damaged body suggests the speed with which it violently collided into a freight truck traveling in the opposite direction. The rental was one of three vehicles involved in a fatal pileup overnight, along the Phillip Goldson Highway, a short distance away from the Corozal Free Zone. Assistant Superintendent Daniel Arzu:</p>
<p> </p>
<div id="attachment_94458" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width:160px;"><a rel="nofollow" class="highslide" target="_blank" href="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0002.jpg"><img class="size-thumbnail wp-image-94458" title="Daniel Arzu" src="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0002-150x150.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="150"/></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Daniel Arzu</p></div>
<p><strong>ASP Daniel Arzu, Deputy O.C., Corozal Police Formation</strong></p>
<p><em>“Sometime around eight p.m. yesterday evening, being January 15<sup>th</sup>, 2014, police responded to a road traffic accident between miles eighty-seven and eighty-eight on the Phillip Goldson Highway. There they observed a truck, a ten wheeler truck overturned and a grey minivan extensively damaged. Also on the scene was also a red pickup apparently involved in the traffic accident.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>The upside-down ten wheeler careened sharply before coming to rest on the side of the highway. Its driver, identified as forty-four-year-old Servando Salazar, survived the impact of the accident. Behind him, another vehicle carrying a customs officer and his wife was also hit.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong><a rel="nofollow" class="highslide" target="_blank" href="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0009.jpg"><img class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-94453" title="Traffic Accident0009" src="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0009-150x150.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="150"/></a>ASP Daniel Arzu</strong></p>
<p><em>“The pickup itself also sustained damages but the minivan has extensive damages. As a result of the accident, apparently the driver was thrown out of the minivan, the driver of the minivan, and landed on the highway. Apparently he sustained head and body injuries and he was rushed to the Corozal Community Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>Aguilar’s passengers, both from Concepcion Village, were also badly injured. Twenty-one-year-old Nelson Pech and sixteen-year-old Francisco Hernandez suffered injuries to the head and foot, as well as abrasions to the right side of the chest, respectively. His uncle was at their family residence when he received word of the tragedy.</p>
<p> </p>
<div id="attachment_94454" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width:160px;"><a rel="nofollow" class="highslide" target="_blank" href="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0008.jpg"><img class="size-thumbnail wp-image-94454 " title="Pedro Mendez" src="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0008-150x150.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="150"/></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Pedro Mendez</p></div>
<p><strong>Pedro Mendez, Uncle of Deceased</strong></p>
<p><em>“At 8:45 he received a call that there was an accident on the highway and that how they were not sure whether the guy is dead or what. When the person that called him reached the area, the scene, they confirmed that yes he was dead.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>The body of the father of two, who began driving taxis at the age of eighteen, was strewn across the highway. Gabriel Pott, the abovementioned customs officer, and his wife Elodia, also sustained varying degrees of harm. He received a large cut wound to the right side of his face and nose, while his wife complained of pain and abrasion to the chest.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong><a rel="nofollow" class="highslide" target="_blank" href="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0001.jpg"><img class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-94451" title="Traffic Accident" src="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0001-150x150.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="150"/></a>ASP Daniel Arzu</strong></p>
<p><em>“There were two passengers in the minivan. Those passengers sustained injuries, minor injuries. They were as well rushed to the Corozal Community Hospital where they were treated and they are in stable condition. The driver and the passenger of the red pickup, the customs officer and his wife also sustained injuries. They were also treated at the Corozal Community Hospital and were subsequently released.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>A police investigation into the road traffic accident remains ongoing. Included is a sobriety test to determine whether alcohol was a factor.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>ASP Daniel Arzu</strong></p>
<p><em>“In terms of alcohol, I would not want to speculate but our investigators are ensuring that sobriety tests are obtained from drivers. In the view of the investigation it would appear that there was speeding, looking at the wreckage or the damages at the scene and that speeding, obviously, could be either by the minivan or the driver of the ten wheel truck but the vehicles are quite extensively damaged and that spells out that there was some kind of speeding indeed.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>The loss of their loved one comes as a shock to Aguilar’s family. The mood around the home was noticeably somber. He was the second of eight children to his parents. Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.</p>
View the full article
<p><strong style="font-size:13px;">But while the Fuller family has every good reason to celebrate, a family up north is grieving the loss of one of their own. On Wednesday night, there was a three-car pile-up involving a ten wheeler truck, a minivan and a pick-up truck in a dark stretch of the highway, not far from the northern border in Santa Elena. The driver of the minivan, Marcelo Aguilar, was thrown out of his vehicle and died on the spot while five other passengers in the two other vehicles sustained varying degrees of injuries. Indications are that speeding was a factor in the collision and police are also conducting alcohol testing. News Five’s Isani Cayetano reports.</strong></p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>Isani Cayetano, Reporting</strong></p>
<p>The mangled remains of this grey Toyota minivan, driven at the time by twenty-eight-year-old Marcelo Aguilar, was towed to Concepcion Village this morning. Its considerably damaged body suggests the speed with which it violently collided into a freight truck traveling in the opposite direction. The rental was one of three vehicles involved in a fatal pileup overnight, along the Phillip Goldson Highway, a short distance away from the Corozal Free Zone. Assistant Superintendent Daniel Arzu:</p>
<p> </p>
<div id="attachment_94458" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width:160px;"><a rel="nofollow" class="highslide" target="_blank" href="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0002.jpg"><img class="size-thumbnail wp-image-94458" title="Daniel Arzu" src="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0002-150x150.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="150"/></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Daniel Arzu</p></div>
<p><strong>ASP Daniel Arzu, Deputy O.C., Corozal Police Formation</strong></p>
<p><em>“Sometime around eight p.m. yesterday evening, being January 15<sup>th</sup>, 2014, police responded to a road traffic accident between miles eighty-seven and eighty-eight on the Phillip Goldson Highway. There they observed a truck, a ten wheeler truck overturned and a grey minivan extensively damaged. Also on the scene was also a red pickup apparently involved in the traffic accident.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>The upside-down ten wheeler careened sharply before coming to rest on the side of the highway. Its driver, identified as forty-four-year-old Servando Salazar, survived the impact of the accident. Behind him, another vehicle carrying a customs officer and his wife was also hit.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong><a rel="nofollow" class="highslide" target="_blank" href="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0009.jpg"><img class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-94453" title="Traffic Accident0009" src="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0009-150x150.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="150"/></a>ASP Daniel Arzu</strong></p>
<p><em>“The pickup itself also sustained damages but the minivan has extensive damages. As a result of the accident, apparently the driver was thrown out of the minivan, the driver of the minivan, and landed on the highway. Apparently he sustained head and body injuries and he was rushed to the Corozal Community Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>Aguilar’s passengers, both from Concepcion Village, were also badly injured. Twenty-one-year-old Nelson Pech and sixteen-year-old Francisco Hernandez suffered injuries to the head and foot, as well as abrasions to the right side of the chest, respectively. His uncle was at their family residence when he received word of the tragedy.</p>
<p> </p>
<div id="attachment_94454" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width:160px;"><a rel="nofollow" class="highslide" target="_blank" href="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0008.jpg"><img class="size-thumbnail wp-image-94454 " title="Pedro Mendez" src="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0008-150x150.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="150"/></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Pedro Mendez</p></div>
<p><strong>Pedro Mendez, Uncle of Deceased</strong></p>
<p><em>“At 8:45 he received a call that there was an accident on the highway and that how they were not sure whether the guy is dead or what. When the person that called him reached the area, the scene, they confirmed that yes he was dead.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>The body of the father of two, who began driving taxis at the age of eighteen, was strewn across the highway. Gabriel Pott, the abovementioned customs officer, and his wife Elodia, also sustained varying degrees of harm. He received a large cut wound to the right side of his face and nose, while his wife complained of pain and abrasion to the chest.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong><a rel="nofollow" class="highslide" target="_blank" href="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0001.jpg"><img class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-94451" title="Traffic Accident" src="http://edition.channel5belize.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Traffic-Accident0001-150x150.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="150"/></a>ASP Daniel Arzu</strong></p>
<p><em>“There were two passengers in the minivan. Those passengers sustained injuries, minor injuries. They were as well rushed to the Corozal Community Hospital where they were treated and they are in stable condition. The driver and the passenger of the red pickup, the customs officer and his wife also sustained injuries. They were also treated at the Corozal Community Hospital and were subsequently released.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>A police investigation into the road traffic accident remains ongoing. Included is a sobriety test to determine whether alcohol was a factor.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>ASP Daniel Arzu</strong></p>
<p><em>“In terms of alcohol, I would not want to speculate but our investigators are ensuring that sobriety tests are obtained from drivers. In the view of the investigation it would appear that there was speeding, looking at the wreckage or the damages at the scene and that speeding, obviously, could be either by the minivan or the driver of the ten wheel truck but the vehicles are quite extensively damaged and that spells out that there was some kind of speeding indeed.”</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>The loss of their loved one comes as a shock to Aguilar’s family. The mood around the home was noticeably somber. He was the second of eight children to his parents. Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.</p>
View the full article