Competition against the clock to build Trump's border wall
Weeks before Donald Trump is due to leave office, workers are actually racing to build the hulking steel fence along the US-Mexican border that was first a good centrepiece of his presidency.
But if their aim is to complete the wall snaking through the desert before Joe Biden movements into the White House in January, then it really is probably mission impossible.
Instead, the president-elect looks establish to inherit a partially built barrier that stands simply because a testament to Trump's tough guidelines towards undocumented migrants he once referred to as criminals and "rapists."
Biden is expected to halt work on a task he has criticized while a waste of US$15 billion.
A month after the Democrat's election win, even so, labourers remain erecting fencing on a stretch of border between your US village of Columbus in New Mexico and the Mexican town of Puerto Palomas.
Using hard hats and scarves to protect from the harsh direct sun light and biting wind, they shifted earth and laid foundations intended for the barrier looming more than the deserts of Chihuahua.
Construction was progressing in a tempo of around 120 meters a day, among the workers told a team of AFP journalists who exactly visited the site.
At that quickness they could build around five . 5 more kilometers (3.5 miles) by Trump's last time in workplace on Jan 19.
"They haven't said that they are going to give up. If they've previously spent cash, how are they likely to keep it unfinished?" the employee explained, before his supervisor reminded him never to talk to reporters.
Up to now, 668 kilometers of the new wall has been completed along the a lot more than 3,000-kilometer border, according to an update from the US Customs and Border Safety agency on Nov 30.
Most of that's reinforcement of an previously existing wall, which used to stand about four meters tall however now towers nearly 10 meters high.
Construction has been centered on the most populated areas, where there are even more illegal crossings.
While Trump's vow to create a "big beautiful wall" over the border looks set to stay an unfulfilled assurance for now, it has recently still left a legacy of shattered dreams and broken bones.
Many people have already been badly injured trying to climb over the barrier, said Alejandro Calderon, a 55-year-previous Cuban who runs a shelter for fellow migrants.
"I've seen men below with head accidents, broken hands, two broken feet. People who have come within wheelchairs," he said.
"And not just two or three but many."
Time and again he offers seen desperation take carry of people fleeing poverty and violence who actually jump into the forbidden land.
But what surprises him the majority of is that the injured are often came back to Mexico without obtaining medical attention.
"They send them back that condition and we must give them medical even though we haven't any doctors," stated Calderon, an engineer by profession.
Domingo Barahona, a 45-year-old Guatemalan, has made two failed tries to enter america.
Now holding out in Puerto Palomas, he ideas to try for a third period.
Just days earlier, he saw several undocumented migrants with gashes exposing the bones in their legs following throwing themselves more than the wall.
"They didn't even get an aspirin while these were coming rear from america," he said.
Barahona left a 12-year-old son behind in the home but sees the United States as his only prospect in order to avoid the fate of his brother, a good policeman killed by "undesirable people."
"I'll die fighting rather than sitting around looking forward to them to kill me personally," he said.
For him and additional migrants hoping to attain america, Trump's defeat has taken hope of a reversal of his tough policies.
Biden "is apparently an extremely humane person," said Elienai Lopes, a 27-year-older Brazilian who has built four failed tries to cross.
"Trump doesn't seem to be to like migrants," he said. - AFP
