page_title: Mexico–United States border
section_title: Border incursions
hierarchical_section_title: Mexico–United States border / Security / Border incursions
caption_attribution_description: sign showing pedestrians the way to the border crossing and the way to Tijuana center
context_page_description: The Mexico–United States border is an international border separating Mexico and the United States, extending from the Pacific Ocean in the west to the Gulf of Mexico in the east. The border traverses a variety of terrains, ranging from urban areas to deserts. The Mexico–United States border is the most frequently crossed border in the world, with approximately 350 million documented crossings annually. It is the tenth-longest border between two countries in the world.
  The total length of the continental border is 3,145 kilometers. From the Gulf of Mexico, it follows the course of the Rio Grande to the border crossing at Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, and El Paso, Texas. Westward from El Paso–Juárez, it crosses vast tracts of the Chihuahuan and Sonoran deserts to the Colorado River Delta and San Diego–Tijuana, before reaching the Pacific Ocean.
context_section_description: According to the U.S. Border Patrol, apprehensions of Central Americans at the US-Mexico border reduced from 70,000 to 55,000 attempted illegal migrants from 2007 to 2011. Thereafter, the number of apprehensions increased dramatically to 95,000 in 2012, 150,000 in 2013 and 220,000 in 2014. The increased apprehensions could have been either due to improved border security, due to a dramatic rise in attempted crossings, or both.
  As per the media, in the fiscal year of 2006, there were twenty-nine confirmed border incursions by Mexican government officials, of which seventeen were by armed individuals. Since 1996, there have been 253 incursions by Mexican government officials. In 2014 the U.S. Department of Homeland Security informed California Representative Duncan D. Hunter that since 2004, there have been 300 documented border incursions, which resulted in 131 individuals being detained.
  The Washington Times has reported that on Sunday, August 3, 2008, Mexican military personnel who crossed into Arizona from Mexico encountered a U.S. Border Patrol agent, whom they held at gunpoint. The soldiers later returned to Mexico, as backup Border Patrol agents came to investigate.
caption: Border for pedestrians in Tijuana, Baja California
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