The grieving widow whose husband and 23-month-old daughter drowned as they were crossing the Rio Grande into the US was seen at the morgue where their bodies were processed.
Tania Vanessa Ávalos, 21, watched from the shore in horror as Oscar Alberto Martinez Ramirez and baby Valerie were swept away by the current on Sunday.
Their bodies were seen in a hearse outside a morgue in Matamoros, Mexico, on Monday.
Tania shielded her face from photographers as she left the building, presumably after identifying the bodies of her loved ones.
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Tania Vanessa Ávalos, 21, is seen Monday leaving the morgue where the bodies of her husband and 23-month-old daughter were transported after they drowned crossing the Rio Grande
Oscar Alberto Martinez Ramirez, 25, and baby Valerie were swept away by the current while crossing from Matamoros, Mexico, into Texas. Their bodies are seen in a hearse at the morgue
Oscar had tucked Valeria into his t-shirt to stop her from drifting away from him. He had dropped her on the US side of the Rio Grande and had turned back to get Tania, still on the Mexican side, but Valeria jumped into the water after him and the pair were swept away
Oscar and Valerie are seen together in a photograph provided by family members after their deaths. 'My son used to tell me that he dreamed that my Valeria would grow up in the United States, away from poverty,' Oscar's mother, Rosa Ramírez, told Mexican media
The family left El Salvador on April 3 and spent two months in a migrant camp in southern Mexico, awaiting news of their asylum request to the US, before they decided to take a bus to the border on Sunday to try to speed up their case.
When they arrived, the consulate was closed but they also learned they were far down a list of hundreds of migrants in line for interviews. They decided to make the crossing illegally rather than wait - a decision that led to their deaths.
Oscar, 25, had carried Valeria across the river from Matamoros to the banks of the river in Brownsville, Texas, and had turned around to fetch his wife from the other side.
Valeria jumped back in to the water when she saw her father go back in.
He swam back to her and the pair were swept away by the current as Tania watched on helpless from the other side.
Officials are seen rolling Oscar's body covered in a white sheet out of the morgue on Monday
Oscar and Valerie's bodies were loaded into a hearse side-by-side after leaving the morgue
Journalists armed with cell phones and video cameras recorded the removal of the bodies
A haunting photograph of their bodies, which were found the next day, showed how Oscar had tucked his daughter inside his t-shirt to try to stop her from drifting away from him.
Her little arm was still draped around his neck, an indication of how she had clung on to him until the final moments of her life.
Tania watched them get carried away in the waters on Sunday and alerted authorities.
Now, their family have shared details of why they left El Salvador in April.
Oscar worked at a Papa Johns pizza restaurant, where he was earning $350 a month.
They lived off his wage, limiting themselves to $10-a-day, because Tania had already quit her job as a cashier in a Chinese restaurant to care for Valeria, their only child.
'My son used to tell me that he dreamed that my Valeria would grow up in the United States, away from poverty,' Oscar's mother, Rosa Ramírez, told Mexican newspaper La Jornada.
'He wanted to buy a house for his family and have a better life. The girl was his world and today the two have gone to heaven. I have always believed that going without [legal] documents to the United States is a great risk that is not worth it.
Today this happened to my boy and my granddaughter, tomorrow we don’t know who else is going to suffer. On top of that they don't want undocumented people in the United States.'
The family arrived in Matamoros on Sunday after boarding a bus in southern Mexico. They went straight to the International Bridge and tried to get an appointment to discuss their asylum case but it was closed and they learned there were hundreds of people in front of them so they tried to cross themselves and were swept away
April 3: Family leaves Altavista, El Salvador for Mexico
They spend two months in a migrant camp on humanitarian visas then decide to make their way to the border.
June 23: The family arrives by bus at the border and goes to the international bridge hoping for an appointment but finds the consulate closed
Oscar decides to try to cross the Rio Grande. He successfully takes Valeria across but drowns trying to save her after she jumped in after him as he swam back to get his wife.
11pm: Search for their bodies is suspended in darkness
June 24: Bodies are found downstream in the river
The family lived with her mother in a housing complex in Altavista.
They were not fleeing violence, Tania's mother has since said, but were in desperate search of a life where they could earn more.
Their plan was to spend a few years in America to save up enough money to eventually return to El Salvador and buy or build their own house.
'I begged them not to go, but he wanted to scrape together money to build a home.
'They hoped to be there a few years and save up for the house,' Rosa Ramirez, Oscar's mother, told The Associated Press on Tuesday.
Determined to eventually get to the US, on April 3, they left El Salvador for Mexico.
There, they were granted a humanitarian visa in Tapachula, which would have allowed them to work for a year there while they awaited news of their asylum request in the US.
After two months in southern Mexico with no prospect of entering the US legally, the family decided to make their way to the border to push their case forward.
Valeria was safely carried to the US side of the river but when she saw her father re-enter the water, she jumped in after him
Valeria's mother Tania Vanessa Ávalos, 21, left, had quit her job in a Chinese restaurant to look after her full time
The harrowing photographs of their bodies, with Valeria's arm still clinging around her father's neck, emerged on Monday as a symbol of the worsening migrant crisis at the border
Tania Vanessa Ãvalos of El Salvador speaks with Mexican authorities after her husband and daughter were swept away by the current while trying to cross
