Traffic & Accidents in Lima
Traffic jams, car crashes, crazy combis, death by sewage tide
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Clarification: It’s called “skitching” (that bombero thing)
I knew there was a word for catching a ride on the back of a moving vehicle: It’s “skitching,” as I’ve just found out. I posted on some skitchers in northern Peru in “Dangerous Skateboarding in Peru” (October 30). Skateboaders in North America skitch rides mainly for the thrill of it, but in Peru, kids do it out of necessity. Skitching rides is the only way that some poor kids in the provinces have to get around. They kids sell food and drinks to truckers along the highway, but don’t even have bicycles to ride. I think the Peruvian skitchers photographed in yesterday’s post deserve this t-shirt: It’s made and sold by Neighborhoodies, available online. The dangers of…
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Dangerous Skateboarding in Peru: Bomberos Hitch Rides, Risk Death on Truckers’ Rigs
My eyes popped when I saw this image on Boing Boing, taken from Zeraga’s Flickr pool via Street Use: In Perú from Huánuco to Tingo Maria, where the road from the Pacific coast across the Andes finds its way towards the Amazon lowlands. This is near the top of the last mountain pass. From there, a soapbox rider can enjoy a vertical 1000 meters of gravity assisted ride. As these kids help stranded truck drivers along the road, they’re called bomberos (firemen). They transport drinks, food and spare parts to broken trucks. A Peruvian (ZU) who travels that part of northern Peru adds: “I usually use that highway go to…
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Hit by Truck, Tree Weeps Blood in Miraflores
Aug. 19, 2008, Lima: More neighborhood destruction to report, resulting from poorly rerouted traffic from Av. Republica Panama (the old Pan-Americana Highway) into our neighborhood. A beautiful old tree was murdered by a reckless Lima truck driver, who had to get from Point A to Point B in as little time as possible — no matter that his vehicle couldn’t fit on our tiny streets. And no police or guards stopped him from making an improper detour. A 32-foot-long trailer bearing a shipping container detoured off busy Rep. Panama into the old family neighborhood of San Antonio, Lima, at approximately 3 p.m., Saturday, August 16. The oversized Ausa truck barrelled down the first block of…
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How to Solve Lima’s Missing Manhole Crisis in a Hurry
The body of the teenage boy who drowned in a Lima sewer has finally been found, Lima police announced July 24. After a 12-day search, the body of Ray Pomiano Villanueva was found in the Huaral district of Chancay, approximately 186 miles from where he fallen into an open manhole. Pomiano, who was trying to catch a bus when he plunged in the hole, was swept away by rushing sewage in front of dozens of witnesses. The boy’s body was found in a sewage drain by fishermen. He was 15 or 16 years old, according to conflicting accounts in Peru21 and El Ojo. Missing manhole covers are common on the streets of Peru, where thieves…
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Lima Teen Falls in Open Manhole & Disappears in Sewer
This is one of the most awful events I’ve heard about recently. Lima has a huge problem with people stealing manhole covers, and the streets are becoming hazardous to pedestrians – now fatally, for one Lima teenager. El Fotógrafo told me about the incident over breakfast. “What a way to go,” he said, shaking his head. The story was so preposterous, I didn’t believe him at first. Then I googled “tapas de desagues [sewer tops], Lima,” and the news item came up on the Peru21 website. Blogger Kalun Lau wrote about a similar theft problem in Trujillo, on his Spanish-language site Kalumonology (Lau’s photo of sewer hole minus lid above).…
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Death Window, Lima Combi Bus
Looking through El Fotógrafo’s photos of the car crash in our neighborhood in April, I was struck by the irony of this image: The driver of the combi had just crashed his busload of passengers into a small car driven by a mother with her preschool daughter. Medics had already arrived on the scene to cart the wounded to the hospital. Combi drivers in Lima are notorious for their recklessness, which borders on the suicidal. Under the skull and crossed daggers, the message in yellow reads: “Si no manejo bien, llama a tu hermana” (If I’m not driving well, call your sister).
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Crazy Combi Collides with Car in San Antonio, Miraflores – Victims Strewn on Sidewalk
LIMA, PERU (4/29/08): You don’t usually see car crashes in my quiet neighborhood of San Antonio, but that changed abruptly last Saturday afternoon, April 26, when a speeding combi bus collided with a small car carrying a mother and child. The combi plowed into a concrete pole at Avenida Arias Aragues and Calle General Silva, by Parque Leoncio Prado, injuring numerous passengers and ramming the other motorist’s car into an orange detour sign. Ambulances carted victims off on stretchers, and police and reporters ran around piecing together events, while angry neighbors lined the sidewalks, fuming, “I told you so.”
