Desert death toll at all-time high

Hector Ortega stumbled across the body of a fellow migrant as he walked across Arizona's harsh desert in the searing summer heat. He tried not to look too closely.

With nothing to be done for the deceased, Ortega and the others trudged on, guided by a smuggler across the US border, determined to complete their illegal odyssey even as they endured record-high temperatures and fever-pitch resentment.

At 64, the farm labourer with a weathered face, strong hands and silver hair protruding from his baseball cap was stoic about the body - someone's journey cut short near a stand of scrub bush and cactus.

"What can you do about it in the desert?" he asked.

Deaths of illegal immigrants in Arizona have soared this summer toward their highest levels since 2005 - a fact that has surprised many who thought that the furore over the state's new immigration law and the 100-plus degree heat would draw them elsewhere along the 2,000-mile US-Mexico border.

But at the Pima County morgue in Tucson, Arizona, the body bags are stacked on stainless-steel shelves from floor to ceiling. A refrigerated truck has been brought in to handle the overflow at the multimillion-dollar facility.

In July, 59 people died - 40 in the first two weeks when nighttime temperatures were the hottest in recorded history, hovering around the low 90s.

The single-month death count is second only to July 2005, when 68 bodies were found.

Of this July's deaths, 44 were on the Tohono O'Odham Nation, a reservation that shares 75 miles of Arizona's border with Mexico. The tribe is opposed to humanitarian aid on its lands, believing it invites violence by people smugglers.

Eighteen more people died in the first 23 days of August.

Even with the prospect of a torturous death and the bitter wrath they face in Arizona, immigrants, including Ortega, say the state's vast, sparsely populated terrain is still the best place for border jumpers.

"In Tijuana, you have two walls that you have to get over," said Ortega, who first came across in 1976 to work in West Coast agricultural fields. "This is much easier here. You just have to watch out for the snakes. That's why I prefer to walk in the daytime and not at night."

He admits he's afraid when he crosses, but states flatly, "It's worth the risk."

Resting at a shelter for failed border crossers that sets atop a steep hill in Mexico overlooking the city of Nogales, Ortega expanded on his motives. "It's the only way to make a little money to support my family," he said.

Sofia Gomez, of an aid group called Humane Borders, said crossers are travelling through even more remote areas than in previous years. At the same time, anger over illegal immigration has led to people shooting up the water stations her group has placed in the desert.

"They're taking a higher risk and they're not making it," Gomez said.

So far this year, the body count is at 171, the same number the Pima County medical examiner's office had seen at this time in 2007, the year the office saw a record 217 deaths.

"We thought the political climate in Arizona would be a significant deterrent to people crossing but as far as the deaths are concerned, they certainly have been what looks like is going to be the highest they've ever been," said the morgue's Dr Eric Peters.

Most of the deceased were young, healthy men - at least at the outset of their trips. By the time they reach the morgue, many are in advanced stages of decomposition and beyond recognition, with bag after bag tagged with "John Doe" or "Jane Doe." Many will probably never be identified.