The Sinaloa State Police is warning motorists driving on the Carretera Internacional Mexico 15 of a recent spike in carjackings and robberies on the highway.
Just last week, an armed group of four men held up an Australian couple traveling back to California in a Chevrolet pickup, while another gang robbed a Freightliner cargo truck. In yet another incident, armed carjackers held up Sinaloa’s education secretary on the busy toll road, making off with his SUV.
In its most recent travel advisory for Mexico, the U.S. State Department highlights the “serious problems” of carjacking and highway robbery in Mexico.
Violent incidents have occurred at all hours of the day and night on both modern toll (“cuotas”) highways and on secondary roads, the advisory notes, although it stresses that “they have occurred most frequently at night and on isolated roads.”The State Department nonetheless urges travelers to drive only in daylight hours.
Many travel guides gloss over the dangers of assaults on the nation’s highways. Despite its excellent reputation for frankness, the Lonely Planet simply states: “Highway robbery happens very rarely. The risk is higher at night, on isolated stretches of highway far from cities, and in 2nd-class buses.”