Father of 5 Critical after RTA
Pablo Martinez
Fifty-five year old Baptist Pastor, Pablo Martinez is tonight fighting for his life at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital. He was critically injured in a road traffic accident this morning near mile thirty-one on the George Price Highway in the same area where a US tourist was killed last week Monday. The father of five was heading back to his family in Frank’s Eddy when he was hit by the eighteen wheeler tow head. Duane Moody reports.
Duane Moody, Reporting
The cut-off to Jaguar Paw near mile thirty-one on the George Price Highway was once again the scene of a horrible traffic accident this morning. Around ten-thirty a.m., an eighteen-wheeler tow head with double containers heading towards Belize City knocked down fifty-five year old Baptist Pastor Pablo Martinez. He was walking on the other side of the road when he was hit from behind. The tow truck ended up in ditch.
George Jones, Eyewitness
“We saw the bus coming from Belize going into Belmopan stop—but it didn’t actually stop at the bus stop, it went a little bit up ahead—and it took off a passenger which was a Spanish descendant man maybe in his late forty-five, maybe fifty. He actually got off the bus and walking back to the direction of going to Belize on the right side going to pan, the left side going from pan. The big truck came from pan going to Belize and all of a sudden we just saw this truck turn off into the left side while the man was walking on the left side of the road coming down and the truck just hit him. The truck ended up into the ditch. When I went there, he was actually on his belly with his neck twisted a little bit. He had a big dig out on the right side of his face and up on top of his head he had a big gulge and he was bleeding rapidly from those areas. His left shoulder was actually broken; I think a couple of his ribs were actually broken, but that was actually not visible, but we know that that actually happened to him in the position that he was in.”
George Jones
Duane Moody
“Was he still breathing?”
George Jones
“At first, when we first checked him, he wasn’t breathing and then when I went back and gave him a second check, then I realized that he was actually still breathing. And that’s when we kept on calling the police and kept on calling the ambulance.”
Martinez was rushed to the Western Regional Hospital in a critical condition, where he was stabilized before being transported to the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital. Like the case of last week’s accident, eyewitnesses say, the ambulance was late in arriving.
George Jones
“We called the police, we called the ambulance. It took the ambulance almost an hour to get here. From Belmopan to here, it is only fifteen minutes; so I think that the ambulance or the government that controls the ambulance need to put these people in check to let them get here quicker and faster to give people more assistance and rendering of aid.”
The Frank’s Eddy villager, and father of five children, was returning home from the city where he went to seek employment in the field of construction. Now the sole breadwinner of the family says his wife, Ana Martinez, is in a critical condition at the hospital.
Ana Martinez
Ana Martinez, Wife of Accident Victim (Translated)
“I was at home when they notified me that he was involved in an accident. When I reached, he was still on the ground. I know he was alive because he watched him, despite he was there on the ground. I couldn’t do anything for him because the police removed me from there. Now he is gravely ill and we need the funds to see what we can do for him if it is not his time to die. But if it’s his time, then we can’t do anything.”
The accident occurred at the same spot where another tow head carrying oranges claimed the life of a tourist a week ago when it slammed into an SUV. Tour guides and residents in the area say that something has to be done to prevent other accidents.
George Jones
“The government also needs to put speed bumps because this is the second accident to happen right here in front of this junction where we work. And this is an area prone for tourists. We always get tourists back here and it’s very delicate spot, a lot of traffic. Especially these big trucks…they need to put some signs for these big trucks, give them speed limits and put some speed bumps to slow them down more because these guys are running about fifty, sixty miles an hour and for them to brake with these big heavy equipments behind them is very hard. And that is exactly what happened here today cause that guy never pulled brakes or anything. He just came over to the left, hit the guy and he ended up in the ditch.”
Ana Martinez (Translated)
“The driver…I don’t know if he was drunk driving, but he was not careful because my husband was on the side of the road and the road is wide for him to have hit my husband from behind.”
The tow head is the property of Dueck Enterprises from Spanish Lookout; its driver has since been taken into custody at the Belmopan Police station. Duane Moody for News Five.
