Photos: Planeload of mothers, children deported from U.S. arrives in Honduras

A child from the first planeload of Honduran women and children who were deported from the U.S. is lifted onto a bus at the Center for Returned Migrants in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, on July 14, 2014. (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

July 14, 2014 5:41 PM PT

A planeload of single mothers and children arrived in gang-ridden San Pedro Sula, Honduras, on Monday, ferried back on a U.S.-chartered flight as an unprecedented surge of Central American migrants has overwhelmed U.S. border enforcement officials in recent months.

A girl from the first planeload of Honduran women and children who were deported from the U.S. stretches her legs before getting on a bus. The migrant center in Honduras gave the children hot food, balloons and lollipops before sending them home or to a temporary shelter on July 14, 2014. (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

A mother leads her son toward a bus at the Center for Returned Migrants in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, on July 14, 2014. (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

A mother and her young child from the first planeload of Honduran women and children who were deported from the U.S. gets on a bus at the Center for Returned Migrants in San Pedro Sula, Honduras July 14, 2014. (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

Diego Hernandez, 6, riding home in a car with his family, is delighted to see his mother, Suyapa Hernandez, 33, after her arrival in San Pedro Sula July 14, 2014. She said she traveled to the U.S. with the help of a smuggler but was arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol near McAllen, Texas. (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

Abigail Galvez, 6, leans on her mother, Angelica, 31, during an interview in San Pedro Sula, Honduras July 14, 2014. She said she and her daughter took the northbound freight train through Mexico in a bid to reunite with her brother in Dallas. (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

The first chartered plane carrying women and children deported from the U.S. arrives in San Pedro Sula, Honduras July 14, 2014. (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)