The killing of Mexican cartel leader Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes on Sunday sparked a wave of retaliatory violence by armed groups, affecting areas popular with foreign tourists such as Puerto Vallarta and Guadalajara.
The U.S. State Department on Monday advised that more areas of Mexico had “returned to normal” following the spread of violence, but warned U.S. citizens in Puerto Vallarta, Guadalajara and Ciudad Guzmán to continue sheltering in place. Several U.S. airlines suspended flights to the popular resort city of Puerto Vallarta, stranding many tourists who had fled the violence and were desperate to return home.
CNN spoke to a number of victims, including Yoni Pizer, an American resident of Puerto Vallarta, who told CNN she was attacked by gunmen during Sunday’s riots, and her car was hijacked, set on fire and used to barricade the road.
Piser said she was on her way to whale watching with her husband and two friends when they came across a white truck stopped at an intersection.
“A young man came running toward me with a gun pointed at my windshield, yelling in Spanish, ‘Get out of the car, get out of the car!'” Pizer told CNN’s Jim Schutt on Monday.
They jumped out of the car. Pizer said the suspect got into the driver’s seat and drove toward the intersection with a gun in his hand.
American speaks of violence in Mexico after drug lord’s murder
“(The perpetrator) threw something that looked like an incendiary device or a bomb into the car, and it immediately exploded into flames. And within two seconds, the truck was on fire,” Peiser said.
As Pizer and his friends fled, they heard explosions and gunshots coming from the car.
“Then, as traffic started to build towards the intersection, they started grabbing people. Some were able to make a U-turn and leave, screaming. Others were caught and dragged from their cars. Their cars were also moved, blocking the road.”
chaos and confusion
Dallas resident Adrian Moorefield was scheduled to return home from Puerto Vallarta on Sunday, but woke up to news that members of an organized crime group had set a bus on fire, blocked roads and clashed with authorities.
“It was a total shock. It felt like I was in the Twilight Zone,” Moorefield told CNN. “We had been to PV before and thought it would be an easy place for a casual beach vacation.”
Jim Beck, an American tourist, told CNN that he was outside his Puerto Vallarta hotel for breakfast on Sunday when he saw “taxi bombs and roads blocked in the middle of the city.”
“Right after that, people were running down the street screaming and telling everyone to go back to the hotel,” Beck said.
Another tourist, Mari, who asked to be referred to by her first name for privacy reasons, said her young family had taken shelter in a vacation rental and watched the riots unfold outside.
“We have two small children and it’s really scary,” she said. “The whole bay was just on fire,” she added. “For hours there was just smoke. You couldn’t see anything out there.”
Another American tourist, Travis Dagenai, told CNN that he woke up Sunday morning in Puerto Vallarta to so much noise that he initially thought there was construction work going on.
“I woke up this morning and saw a lot of what appeared to be demolition of buildings,” Dagenai said.
He said it took some time to figure out what was going on as reports of the disruption gradually began to surface on social media. Soon, from his balcony, he could see the riot unfolding.
“I was able to see quite directly, a little bit more visibly, some of the tactics and some of the cars that were being set on fire, some of the looting that was going on as local stores and buildings were attacked,” he said, adding, “Right now the city smells like burnt rubber.”
Dagenai said she and other tourists are currently facing a lot of uncertainty.
“How long will this lockdown last, so to speak? How long will the airport be closed? What are the solutions? What are some of those answers, or are they just part of the plans we can make?” he wondered.
Dagenai added that most of her fellow tourists were coping with the sudden disruption “with a degree of patience and an understanding of things that are out of their control.”
“I really hope that everyone in this city, everyone in this country, can feel some sense of normalcy and some level of safety after this,” he added.
An American woman from California visiting family in Mexico told CNN that she was temporarily separated from her son and left home wondering where he would get his next meal.
Priscilla, whose last name is being withheld by CNN for safety reasons, arrived in Tepic on Saturday. Priscilla’s teenage son spent the night at his cousin’s house, about 20 minutes from the hotel.
She was unable to take her son with her due to repeated curfews, but she says he is safe.
“I’ve been coming to Mexico ever since I was a child and I’ve never encountered anything like this,” she told CNN on Sunday.
She told CNN that she witnessed suspected cartel members setting several vehicles on fire nearby. She added that the streets were then empty and only the sound of an ambulance could be heard.
