LOS ANGELES, June 24 (Xinhua) -- 57 undocumented immigrants, including a pregnant woman and 1-year-old toddler, were rescued by U.S. Border Patrol agents after smugglers abandoned them in the desert near border between Mexico and U.S. state of Arizona.
According to a report published in the local Arizona Daily Star newspaper, these immigrants, who were from Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, Friday afternoon stranded in the 108-degree-temperature (42.2 degree centigrade) stifling area west of Lukeville, 750 kilometers west of Los Angeles.
U.S. Agents were alerted to the group's situation after receiving a call from the Sonora, Mexico's 911 center relaying information from persons within the group. The callers stated they had crossed the border illegally and requested assistance.
Through the collaborative search effort of CBP assets on the ground and in the air, agents encountered the group consisted of 21 adults and 36 minors, in which 17 were traveling unaccompanied.
Only one person from the group required further medical attention.
The border in the area where the group crossed runs only a few hundred feet from a Mexican highway and is physically controlled by a waist-high vehicle barrier and sensors, the report said.
