LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — A Las Vegas couple visiting Puerto Vallarta for a Rotary Club service project found themselves just feet away from cartel members as fires burned and chaos erupted across the normally peaceful Mexican resort town.
Keith Thomas, a longtime Las Vegas resident, was in Puerto Vallarta when Mexican special forces killed cartel leader "El Mencho" on Sunday, triggering a wave of violence that transformed the coastal city overnight.
Abel Garcia hears from Las Vegas locals who witnessed the chaos in Puerto Vallarta:
"Everybody we talked to said they hadn't seen anything like this in 20 years," Thomas said. "When the cartel guy came whipping through our portico — that's when it really made it real."
Cars and buses were set ablaze. Storefronts burned. Cartel members sped through the streets just feet from bystanders.
Thomas said the violence appeared calculated.
"One of their primary intents was to cause chaos and disruption in the traffic patterns, than it was to kill anybody," Thomas said.
Thomas and his wife, Sherry, were preparing to attend church when the situation began to deteriorate.
"We were headed to church; no Ubers available. Went downstairs for a taxi; they said the roads are blocked. Then, we started to see smoke plumes moving north. [They] eventually got within two blocks of our hotel," Thomas said.
From their sixth-floor balcony, the couple watched as fires crept closer and the disruption unfolded directly outside their hotel entrance.
"The bellboys started ducking for cover and yelled run, so we all jumped. That was as close as we got to it," Thomas said.
The couple was told to stay inside, and they did. Thomas said the fires burned until about 4 p.m., when crews began clearing out cars.
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'Surreal': US tourist describes chaotic scenes in Mexico amid cartel violence
By the next morning, he said, Puerto Vallarta felt almost normal again.
"Beautiful day, no cartel activity at all, lots of traffic again, restaurants getting ready to open up," Thomas said.
Thomas told me he traveled to Mexico with his Rotary Club to provide water filters to small villages, helping families access clean drinking water and avoid illness.
Despite the close calls, Thomas said he never felt unsafe. Still, he acknowledged the situation was unlike anything he had seen in his five years visiting Puerto Vallarta.
With flights beginning to resume, Thomas and his wife plan to return home to Las Vegas on Wednesday, carrying memories of both the good they accomplished for the community and the violence they witnessed just feet away.
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