RIO BRAVO, Tamaulipas — Machine gunfire and rolling battles along the main avenues of this city spread terror among townspeople who tried to hide inside homes and businesses. Stray bullets went through the walls of some houses.
The violence took place on Friday morning when Mexican soldiers and cartel gunmen clashed along the streets of this city. Rio Bravo is immediately south of Donna, Texas, and has an international bridge connecting both cities.
A citizen journalist recorded the moment when a convoy of soldiers blocked a street and began to engage a group of gunmen.
While neither the federal or the state governments have released any official information about the event, unofficial sources revealed to Breitbart Texas that at least three cartel gunmen died in the battle.
Military personnel were deployed throughout the main avenues of this city. For more than an hour, local residents took to social media to keep each other informed about the areas where the shooting was taking place. Primary flashpoints were in the Graciano Sanchez neighborhood and the Rural Road 15, which leads to the border city of Reynosa.
Editor’s Note: Breitbart Texas traveled to the Mexican States of Tamaulipas, Coahuila and Nuevo León to recruit citizen journalists willing to risk their lives and expose the cartels silencing their communities. The writers would face certain death at the hands of the various cartels that operate in those areas including the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas if a pseudonym were not used. Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles are published in both English and in their original Spanish. This article was written by “A.C. Del Angel” from Reynosa, Tamaulipas and “J.A. Espinoza” from Matamoros Tamaulipas.