Young man dies in single vehicle incident on the Hummingbird Highway

An afternoon traffic incident on the Hummingbird Highway has claimed the life of a 21-year-old man from the Cayo District.  Just after one o’clock this afternoon, Belmopan Police responded to mile 48½ on the Hummingbird Highway and found a badly damaged red Toyota Matrix on the left side of the road. A short distance away, they discovered the motionless body of a Lazaro Eliseo Alonzo who had suffered severe injuries.    According to the initial police investigation, Alonzo was the only person inside the vehicle and was travelling from Armenia Village toward Belmopan when, for reasons that are still being investigated, he veered onto the right side of the highway and lost control of the vehicle. Police say the Matrix overturned before coming to rest on the opposite side of the road. During the crash, Alonzo was thrown from the vehicle and suffered fatal injuries.  National Road Maintenance Unit Coordinator at the Ministry of Infrastructure Development and Housing, Efrain Alpuche, was among those who came upon the incident prior to the authorities.  Alpuche told Love News that he stopped to assist at the scene and tried to shield the body from passing motorists who were attempting to take pictures and videos.

Efrain Alpuche, Passerby: “I was heading from Hummingbird, remember we had a washout no ? So I was coming from up that side coming back because the road is opened now, the highway was open so we could cross so I came back and I was coming back to Belmopan that’s when I encountered the accident. When I turned the traffic kinda slowed down because people were watching what was happening and I pulled off on the side of the road and the other people that were out there told me that the guy had already passed away. So when I walked over I saw he died for real because his head was twisted. And then everybody was slowing down to take videos and pictures and so I kind of stood up in front of the guy so that people move on and move on the traffic and found some kind of covering and kinda covered up the guy. He careened off to the left hand side of the road. He slammed into that rock wall it would seem. I guess he came around the curve too much I guess and hauled off to the left because the car was on the left hand side heading towards Belmopan and he was on the right hand side of the vehicle out on the road side. No seatbelt. Because the vehicle wasn’t damaged that bad, if he had on his seatbelt he wouldn’t have been in there you know dead or injured, he would have been in the vehicle. And then you have to check the police whatever evidence they find in the vehicle.”

Alonzo’s body was takento the Western Regional Hospital, where he was pronounced dead shortly after two this afternoon.  However, due to limited space at the morgue, he was transferred to the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital morgue in Belize City, where a post-mortem examination will be conducted./