In the fields of Jalisco, Mexico, pigs dressed like people are being buried, burned, chopped, and wrapped in lime.
It sounds like either an incredible feast is about to take place or something extraordinarily grim is happening. It’s a little of the latter, but it’s all a part of a larger effort to more easily find remains of the 130,000 people officially classified as missing as a result of cartel violence.
The AP reports that a coalition of scientists from Mexico, Canada, and the UK is using this grotesque, high-stakes experiment to train technology to find impromptu graves.
The researchers are testing the efficacy of several body hunting methods. Thermal drones, hyperspectral cameras, and even flies and flowers are being tested to see what might lead to remains buried by drug cartels in Mexico’s soil.
Pigs, Drones, and Lasers Are Helping Find Mexican Drug Cartel Victims
This macabre fieldwork is born out of necessity. The Mexican government has largely left families to conduct their searches. It’s not uncommon to see a person searching for a loved one in cartel territory by pushing metal rods into dirt, hoping a whiff of decay poofs out of the ground that might be the smell of their relative rotting in the ground.
This grassroots, folk expertise is driving national research. Families have shown scientists how graves leave subtle traces. Plants bloom differently, dirt behaves oddly, and certain trees grow vertically to provide shade for diggers. The telltale signs of a cartel grave are there; you have to know what to look for.
Jalisco is the epicenter of the crisis. It’s home to one of the largest cartels in Mexico, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. Human bone fragments and heaps of clothing are found in remote ranches across the state, but officials often deny they’re mass graves.
That’s where the pig corpses come in: mapping how death affects soil, bugs, and plants helps researchers create a blueprint for future searches. There are high-tech solutions, like thermal drones and satellite imaging, but they’re expensive and their use is sporadic across the country.
“This isn’t pure science,” says lead researcher José Luis Silván. “It’s science and action.”
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