What in tarnation?! A Texas truck driver is feeling the heat after hiding migrants in his rig. He was smuggling two people from Mexico by trying to hide them in the gas tank. That probably wasn’t a comfortable ride. 

Texas truck driver smuggles migrants in truck gas tank

What started as a routine traffic stop in Webb County, Texas quickly led to an arrest as police officers found men hidden in the gas tanks. 

Deputies pulled the tractor trailer over about 160 miles away from southwest San Antonio. During an inspection, the officers noticed that one of the gas tanks didn’t look right. 

Texas Department of Public Safety Lieutenant Chris Olivarez shared that the truck driver immediately told officers that bodies were in the truck. 

According to Bradenton, body camera footage showed the police officers searching the truck and finding two bodies in the cylindrical metal gas tank. 

A typical semi truck gas tank holds between 120 to 150 gallons of fuel but some can hold up to 400 gallons. About 150 gallons of fuel weighs 1,065 lbs, so the tank was strong enough to hold the weight of two men. 

Also, an average tank is about 60 inches long and 26 inches deep. That’s a tight squeeze for just one person. 

It’s unclear how long the Mexican men were cramped together in the gas tank. Also, I wonder if they were lying in gas the entire time. Perhaps the trucker only filled one tank with diesel. 

The trucker was arrested and charged with two counts of smuggling persons. Then the two migrants were turned over to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. 

Officials attribute this stop to Operation Lone Star. Its an effort to stop the smuggling of drugs, people, and people into Texas. Since the operation started, roughly 525,800 migrants believed to be in the United States illegally have been apprehended.