The tragedy unfolded as the largest flow of refugees in Europe since World War II reached crisis levels, and a summit meeting of the continent’s top leaders was convened in the Hofburg palace in Vienna. By August, more than 2,500 men, women and children had drowned making the treacherous voyage across the Mediterranean in rickety boats and rafts that year, and an untold number had died trekking across the Continent.

As politicians debated what to do, before dawn on Aug. 26, a desperate group of 59 men, eight women and four children from Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and Syria were herded into a refrigerated truck in southern Hungary. Smugglers had promised safe passage to Germany.

Three hours later, the migrants were all dead. They were found the next morning, in sweltering heat, on a highway leading to Vienna, just 31 miles or so from the Hofburg.

Days later, a visibly shaken Chancellor Angela Merkel announced that Germany would open its borders to those clamoring to get into the country — a policy decision that reverberates across the Continent to this day. Italy recently refused entry to a rescue ship carrying hundreds of migrants, and an increasing number of European Union nations adamantly oppose any plan requiring them to share the responsibility of sheltering refugees and asylum seekers.

Beyond the politics, though, the case in Hungary offers a reminder of an unavoidable fact: Desperate people will take desperate measures, even if it can cost them their lives. The tragedy also highlighted how many people, including some former refugees, had taken advantage of the crisis to enrich themselves by turning humans into cargo.