As thousands of vacationers swarmed the lakeshore area over the Easter holiday period, two fatalities were reported in separate incidents at local hotels.
A three-year-old boy died from drowning in a pool at Chapala’s Hotel Montercarlo on Sunday, April 16. Apparently escaping the vigilance of his mother, the toddler succumbed after flipping over and becoming trapped face down in the water under a flotation device. A rescue team from Chapala’s Civil Protection unit arrived at the scene, applying CPR procedures for more than 30 minutes but failed to revive the boy.
Two days later, an elderly female guest at Ajijic’s Hotel Real was found dead in her room, the probable victim of heart failure. The body of the 70-year-old visitor from Guanajuato was discovered after friends who came to pick her up for an appointment told hotel staffers she wasn’t responding to their phone calls.
Civil Protection chief Enrique Perales estimates that 12,000 to 18,000 visitors flooded the Chapala area on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, the busiest days of the Holy Week period. Despite the intense flow of traffic, he indicated there have been few highway accidents to date.
Two girls were hit by a car as they crossed the road in La Floresta on foot and two other minors were injured when their four-wheel motorcycle was struck from behind by a vehicle traveling on the Chapala-Mezcala highway.