Last Friday, a spectacular truck crash on Route 40, near Perdriel, Mendoza, led to a massive looting, documented and viralized by a local influencer. A Brazilian truck transporting Chilean olive oil to a neighboring country overturned due to a maneuver error by a pickup truck. Instead of solidarity, the scene quickly turned into a focal point of tension: dozens of people swarmed to take the merchandise, while influencer Julaa Greco narrated the events live to her 342,000 followers. "A truck overturned, and we have to go get some," the young woman is heard saying in the video that caused strong outrage on social media. The situation escalated when the police tried to secure the cargo. According to police sources, officers were met with a hail of stones from the crowd trying to seize the bottles. The confrontation resulted in damage to several police vehicles and forced a larger deployment to contain the active resistance of the residents. Ironically, in images shared by Greco himself, he can be seen thanking the province for the 'products' while filming private pickup trucks loaded with more than ten crates of oil stolen from the overturned semi-trailer. The speed of the digital black market became evident just hours after the accident. As a Mendoza media outlet was able to confirm, the same bottles of Chilean olive oil lying on the roadside in Luján de Cuyo began appearing on platforms like Marketplace. The availability of stolen goods on digital trading circuits shows the speed at which goods from traffic accidents enter secondary markets, bypassing any sanitary or tax controls. This episode revives the debate on road safety in Mendoza, recalling a similar incident that occurred six months ago in Guaymallén. On that occasion, a refrigerated truck fell from a bridge on the East Access, spilling tons of meat. The scene was almost identical: clashes with the police, use of tear gas, and a crowd that justified the looting due to the economic crisis.
