It's been a decade since 43 students disappeared in Mexico. Their parents still fight for answers

TIXTLA, México (AP) — Clemente Rodríguez has been documenting the long search for his missing son with tattoos.

First, it was an ink drawing of a turtle — a symbol of 19-year-old Christian Rodríguez's school — with a smaller turtle on its shell. Then, an image of Mexico's patron saint, the Virgin of Guadalupe, accompanied by the number 43. Later, a tiger for strength and a dove for hope.

“How else is my son going to know that I have been looking for him?” asked Rodríguez. To the heartbroken father, the body art is evidence that he never stopped searching — proof he could perhaps one day show to his boy.

On Sept. 26, 2014, Christian Rodríguez, a tall boy who loved to folk dance and had just enrolled in a teachers college in the southern state of Guerrero, disappeared along with 42 classmates. Every year since, on the 26th of each month, Clemente Rodríguez, his wife, Luz María Telumbre, and other families meet at the Rural Normal School at Ayotzinapa and take a long bus ride to the capital, Mexico City, to demand answers.

They will do so again next week, on the 10th anniversary of their sons’ disappearance.

“It is hard, very hard,” Clemente Rodríguez said.

Rodríguez and the other parents are not alone. The 43 students are among more than 115,000 people still reported as missing in Mexico, a reflection of numerous unresolved crimes in a country where human rights activists say violence, corruption and impunity have long been the norm.

Over the years, authorities have offered different explanations. The previous administration of President Enrique Peña Nieto said that the students were attacked by security forces linked to a local drug cartel, and that the bodies were then turned over to organized crime figures, who burned their bodies in a dump and threw their ashes in a river. A bone fragment of one of the students was later found in the river.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador's administration confirmed the source of the attack. But the current justice department — along with the Interamerican Commission on Human Rights and a Truth Commission formed specifically to investigate the students’ disappearance — refuted the story about the incineration of the bodies in a dump. They accused top former officials of planting the bone fragment in the river to suit their narrative. They also unearthed clues in a different location, including bone fragments from one of Christian's feet.

But the families still don't have any solid answers about what happened to the students. For his part, Clemente Rodríguez is far from convinced that his son is dead.

Not long after the students disappeared, parents took matters into their own hands, charging into remote, often gang-controlled mountain towns to search for their children. They encountered others who had been displaced by violence. Fear was everywhere.

“When I left the house, I never knew if I would come back alive,” Rodríguez said.

During the search, Christina Bautista, the 49-year-old mother of missing student Benjamin Ascencio, says strangers told her they'd been searching for a son for three years or a daughter for five. She had thought it would be a matter of weeks.

“I couldn’t take it, I took off running,” she said. “How could there be so many disappeared?”

Dozens of bodies were found, but not those of their children.

A decade of fighting to keep the case alive has turned the parents’ lives inside out. Before his son’s disappearance, Rodríguez sold jugs of water from the back of his pickup and tended a small menagerie of animals in the town of Tixtla, not far from the school. Telumbre sold handmade tortillas cooked over a wood fire.

When the students vanished, however, they dropped everything. Parents sold or abandoned their animals, left fields untended and entrusted grandparents with the care of other children.

Rodríguez, 56, has since managed to partially reassemble his clutch of livestock and has planted some corn on the family's plot of land. The family's main income, however, comes from homemade crafts sold on trips to Mexico City: mats woven from reeds; bottles of an uncle's locally brewed mezcal decorated with twine and colorful tiger faces; and cloth napkins embroidered by Telumbre.

Sometimes the stocky, soft-spoken Rodríguez visits his land to think or to release his anger and sadness. “I start to cry, let it all go,” he said.

Parents also find solace at the Rural Normal School at Ayotzinapa.

The school, which trains students to teach in poor remote villages, is part of a network of rural educational facilities with a long history of radical activism. School walls painted with slogans demanding justice for the missing students also display murals honoring Che Guevara and Karl Marx.

For the poorest families, Ayotzinapa offers a way out: Students receive free room, board and an education. In exchange, they work.

The atmosphere has militaristic undertones: New students’ heads are shaved and the first year is about discipline and survival. They are tasked with tending cattle, planting fields and commandeering buses to drive to protests in the capital. The students who disappeared in 2014 were abducted from five buses they had taken over in the city of Iguala, 120 kilometers (75 miles) north of the school.

Parents arrived at Ayotzinapa little by little from villages deep in the mountains. They gathered on the school’s basketball court, a concrete pad under a pavilion where 43 chairs still hold photos of each of the missing students.

In the years since, a certain codependency has developed. The school's fight for justice is fueled by the parents' grief and anger. The school's students, meanwhile, “are our strong arm,” Bautista says. “Here is where the movement started.”

Students treat the parents respectfully and affectionately, greeting them as “aunt” or “uncle” as they pass through the guarded gates.

In late August, Rodríguez and other parents met for the last time with López Obrador, who leaves office at the end of this month.

The exchange was a grave disappointment.

“Right now, this administration is just like that of Enrique Peña Nieto,” Rodríguez said. “He’s tried to mock us” by hiding information, protecting the Army and insulting the families' lawyers, he said.

López Obrador continues to insist that his government has done its best to find answers. He cites dozens of arrests, including that of a former attorney general charged with obstructing justice. He has downplayed the role of the military, however. Years ago, López Obrador declared the students’ abduction a “state crime,” pointing to the involvement of local, state and federal authorities, including the Army.

The families met in July with López Obrador’s successor, Claudia Sheinbaum, who will take office Oct. 1, but she made no promises or commitments.

After the August meeting, Rodríguez posed for a portrait in the National Palace, his gaze firm and his fist raised.

Like other parents, he vows to keep fighting.

“During these 10 years, we have learned a lot about obfuscation ... lies,” Rodríguez said. Top military and government authorities “have the answers,” he added.

“They can reveal them."

Luz María Telumbre, whose son Christian is one of 43 missing students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School, protests for justice in the 10-year case in Mexico City, Monday, Aug. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Jesus Castro Rafaela, a first-year student at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School protests for justice in the 10-year case of 43 missing classmates, in Mexico City, Monday, Aug. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Indigenous women protest for justice in the 10-year case of 43 missing students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Mexico City, Monday, Aug. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Posters of the 43 missing students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School hang on the roadside, seen from the bus of their families who are traveling from Tixtla, Guerrero state, to the capital to protest for justice 10 years since their disappearance, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Christian Rodríguez's sister Carmen busses to the capital to protest for justice in the 10-year case of 43 missing students, including her brother, after departing Tixtla, Guerrero state, Mexico, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. The missing students were all from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

First-year students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School bus from Tixtla, Guerrero state, to the capital to protest for justice in the 10-year case of their 43 missing classmates, Monday, Aug. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

A religious altar that reads in Spanish "We are missing 43!" stands inside the home of Cristina Bautista in Tixtla, Guerrero state, Mexico, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. Bautista is the mother of Benjamin Ascencio, one of the 43 missing students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Cristina Bautista, whose son Benjamin Ascencio is one of 43 missing students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School who went missing 10 years prior, embroiders her son's name at home in Tixtla, Guerrero state, Mexico, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Mayrani Ascencio, whose brother Benjamin is one of 43 missing students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School stands at home in Tixtla, Guerrero state, Mexico, late Friday, Aug. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Clemente Rodriguez, whose son Christian is one of 43 missing students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School attends his corn crop in Tixtla, Guerrero state, Mexico, Saturday, Aug. 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Clemente Rodríguez and Luz María Telumbre, whose son Christian is one of 43 missing students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School bottle mezcal at home in Tixtla, Guerrero state, Mexico, to sell in the capital, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

A student walks at the dormitory of the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

A student plays with a dog outside his dormitory at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Erick de la Cruz jokes around on the first day of class at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Aug. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

First-year students line up before starting cleanup work at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Saturday, Aug. 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

A student walks on the campus of the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, late Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

First-year students gather in the dining hall at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Murals and the number 43 decorate the dormitory area at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School, the teachers' college from where 43 students went missing 10 years ago, in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Aug. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

Students cut each other's hair at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Aug. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

Political posters and stickers hang inside the print shop at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

First-year students at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School sweep the parking lot of their school in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Saturday, Aug. 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

A mural covers the dormitories of the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Aug. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

Students leave the dormitory area of the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Aug. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

First-year student Jesus Castro Rafaela walks inside the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School where a sign memorializes Julio Cesar Mondragon Fontes, a student who died on the night that 43 fellow students went missing, in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Aug. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

First-year students walk by a mural featuring some of their 43 missing classmates at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Students check their schedules on the first day of classes at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, state, Mexico, Monday, Aug. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Students' clothes hang to dry in a field at the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Aug. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

The entrance of the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School features a turtle and the words "We want the 43," referring to the number of students who went missing 10 years ago, in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Aug. 19, 2024. Ayotzinapa means "The place of the turtles" in the Nahuatl Indigenous language. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

The Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School stands in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Saturday, Aug. 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

Photos of 43 students who have been missing for 10 years cover the stairs at their former Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero state, Mexico, Saturday, Aug. 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez)

RHO, Italy (AP) — No ice is colder and harder than speedskating ice. The precision it takes has meant that Olympic speedskaters have never competed for gold on a temporary indoor rink – until the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Games.

In the pursuit of maximum glide and minimum friction, Olympic officials brought on ice master Mark Messer, a veteran of six previous Olympic speedskating tracks and the ice technician in charge of the Olympic Oval in Calgary, Canada — one of the fastest tracks in the world with over 300 records.

Messer has been putting that experience to work one thin layer of ice at a time since the end of October at the new Speed Skating Stadium, built inside adjacent trade fair halls in the city of Rho just north of Milan.

“It’s one of the biggest challenges I’ve had in icemaking,’’ Messer said during an interview less than two weeks into the process.

If Goldilocks were a speedskater, hockey ice would be medium hard, for fast puck movement and sharp turns. Figure skating ice would be softer, allowing push off for jumps and so the ice doesn’t shatter on landing. Curling ice is the softest and warmest of all, for controlled sliding.

For speedskating ice to be just right, it must be hard, cold and clean. And very, very smooth.

“The blades are so sharp, that if there is some dirt, the blade will lose the edge,’’ Messer said, and the skater will lose speed.

Speedskater Enrico Fabris, who won two Olympic golds in Turin in 2006, has traded in his skates to be deputy sports manager at the speedskating venue in Rho. For him, perfect ice means the conditions are the same for all skaters — and then if it's fast ice, so much the better.

"It's more of a pleasure to skate on this ice,'' he said.

Messer’s first Olympics were in Calgary in 1988 — the first time speedskating was held indoors. “That gave us some advantages because we didn’t have to worry about the weather, wind blowing or rain,’’ he said. Now he is upping the challenge by becoming the first ice master to build a temporary rink for the Olympics.

Before Messer arrived in Italy, workers spent weeks setting up insulation to level the floor and then a network of pipes and rubber tubes that carry glycol — an antifreeze — that is brought down to minus 7 or minus 8 degrees Celsius (17.6 to 19.4 degrees Fahrenheit) to make the ice.

Water is run through a purification system — but it can’t be too pure, or the ice that forms will be too brittle. Just the right amount of impurities “holds the ice together,’’ Messer said.

The first layers of water are applied slowly, with a spray nozzle; after the ice reaches a few centimeters it is painted white — a full day’s work — and the stripes are added to make lanes.

“The first one takes about 45 minutes. And then as soon as it freezes, we go back and do it again, and again and again. So we do it hundreds of times,’’ Messer said.

As the ice gets thicker, and is more stable, workers apply subsequent layers of water with hoses. Messer attaches his hose to hockey sticks for easier spreading.

What must absolutely be avoided is dirt, dust or frost — all of which can cause friction for the skaters, slowing them down. The goal is that when the skaters push “they can go as far as possible with the least amount of effort,’’ Messer said.

The Zamboni ice resurfacing machine plays a key role in keeping the track clean, cutting off a layer and spraying water to make a new surface.

One challenge is gauging how quickly the water from the resurfacing machine freezes in the temporary rink.

Another is getting the ice to the right thickness so that the Zamboni, weighing in at six tons, doesn’t shift the insulation, rubber tubing or ice itself.

“When you drive that out, if there’s anything moving it will move. We don’t want that,’’ Messer said.

The rink got its first big test on Nov. 29-30 during a Junior World Cup event. In a permanent rink, test events are usually held a year before the Olympics, leaving more time for adjustments. “We have a very small window to learn,’’ Messer acknowledged.

Dutch speedskater Kayo Vos, who won the men’s neo-senior 1,000 meters, said the ice was a little soft — but Messer didn’t seem too concerned.

“We went very modest to start, now we can start to change the temperatures and try to make it faster and still maintain it as a safe ice,’’ he said.

Fine-tuning the air temperature and humidity and ice temperature must be done methodically — taking into account that there will be 6,000 spectators in the venue for each event. The next real test will be on Jan. 31, when the Olympians take to the ice for their first training session.

“Eighty percent of the work is done but the hardest part is the last 20 percent, where we have to try to find the values and the way of running the equipment so all the skaters get the same conditions and all the skaters get the best conditions,’’ Messer said.

AP Winter Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

Serpentines are set on the ice of the stadium where speed skating discipline of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics will take place, in Rho, outskirt of Milan, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

Ice Master Mark Messer poses in the stadium where speed skating discipline of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics will take place, in Rho, outskirt of Milan, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

Workers clean the ice surface during a peed skating Junior World Cup and Olympic test event, in Rho, near Milan, Italy, Saturday, Nov. 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

Ice Master Mark Messer poses in the stadium where speed skating discipline of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics will take place, in Rho, outskirt of Milan, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

Ice Master Mark Messer poses in the stadium where speed skating discipline of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics will take place, in Rho, outskirt of Milan, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)