A mid-morning road collision on one of the Dominican Republic’s major highways has left five Haitian migrants and one driver injured, disrupting an operation to transfer irregularly positioned foreign nationals to the country’s border for deportation.
The incident unfolded just after 8:40 a.m. on Tuesday at the San Juan intersection, which sits along the busy Francisco del Rosario Sánchez highway. The two vehicles involved were both owned and operated by the Dominican Republic’s General Directorate of Migration (DGM), tasked with moving people who entered or stayed in the country without valid immigration documentation.
Preliminary information from the DGM confirms the crash was triggered by a sudden tire blowout on the lead vehicle. When the first vehicle slowed abruptly after the tire failure, the driver of the following DGM truck reacted quickly, slamming on brakes and swerving to avoid impact, but could not prevent a collision with the rear end of the disabled first vehicle.
Five Haitian nationals being transported in the collision suffered minor injuries, and the driver of one of the two vehicles also required medical attention. Responding teams from the Dominican Republic’s National Emergency Care System arrived swiftly at the scene, transporting all injured people to the Dr. Alejandro Cabral Regional Hospital for treatment. Local authorities have confirmed that as of initial assessments, every person affected by the crash is in stable condition.
While the collision caused significant material damage to both DGM vehicles, emergency response teams cleared the roadway quickly to restore full traffic flow. Once road safety was reestablished and all injured parties were cared for, DGM officials resumed their planned migration operation.
In total, 304 Haitian nationals were being transported by the two vehicles ahead of the crash. The DGM confirmed that the uninjured migrants continued their journey to the Carrizal border crossing in Elías Piña, where they were scheduled to be formally transferred to Haitian border authorities as planned.