Narcosubmarino caught with seven tons of cocaine in the Pacific

The US Coast Guard intercepted a "narco-submarine" carrying more than seven tons of cocaine. The episode occurred June 18 in the Pacific Ocean. The illegal ship had left the Colombian coast. The home-made submarines are a fairly common resource for importing cocaine into Colombia from the United States, but this idea has not been taken into account for several years.

In the video, barely a minute, a member of the Guard hears screaming against the submarine, demanding that he stop. While they pursue the ship with two high-speed inflatable boats, the specialized commands are approaching the time they scream at the crew. When one of the boats manages to catch up, and that to the waves, two soldiers jump on the submarine. One of the men hits the turret and forces the crew to open it. Thus, the guard managed to get on board the submarine and force smugglers to surrender.

While advertising the video, the US Coast Guard said it was tasked with patrolling the Eastern Pacific area "with the equivalent of only two police cars", which means it does not can capture only 11 people. "narco-submarines", according to CNN. The Coast Guard, equivalent to the Naval Prefecture, complains that its fleet of patrol boats is of great antiquity and that these ships are not able to cope with the challenge of "submarines".

70% of the Coast Guard fleet is over 50 years old. The boats are slow and require a lot of maintenance. "They are not efficient enough to deal with this new threat," said Commander Stephen Brickey.

These boats are often built in the jungle to avoid detection. But even if the coastguard manages to detect the device, it must act quickly. All are built with the ability to sink and destroy evidence in minutes. At a considerable speed in the case of the sea, Coast Guard fast patrol boats badisted by a larger vessel pursued the semi-submersible, similar to a clbadic, but much smaller, conventional submarine.

Between the screams of the Coast Guard troops to stop the narco ship, American ships manage to catch up with the submarine. It is at this point that between one and two troops dressed in special forces clothing jump on the submarine, board, hit the entrance hatch and end up in the lane. ;open. From a hole, a man with raised arms, whose face is pixilated in the pictures.

The Coast Guard vessel that led the operation is the Munro. The operation took place in the international waters of the eastern Pacific. According to ABC, the images were taken on June 18th. The CBS network also reported the episode.

In the video, we hear the screams in Spanish from the North American crew who, after being identified, order: "Stop your ship now! Stop already your ship!". In the middle of the operation, one of the members of the North American crew admits that it "will be difficult to ride (to the submarine) that is moving at full speed".

One of the two Coast Guard boats that we see in the video manages to approach the submersible. It is at this moment that two crew members jump on it. One of the crew members heads towards the hatch while hammering until an unidentified person opens it.

A maritime patrol aircraft first sighted the submarine and informed Munro, Lieutenant-Commander Stephen Brickey told ABC News. The Coast Guard vessel sent a helicopter over the line of sight of the submarine and directed the two smaller vessels to its location.

"It's really hard to detect, so the aircraft is looking for a great job," Captain Munro captain Jim Estramante told ABC News. "Ours has done a great job in locating it." The submarine long 45 feet (about 14 meters) traveled about 10 miles to the hour "hundreds of kilometers from the border between Ecuador and Colombia," said Brickey.

The team that embarked on the submersible is specialized in high-risk boarding and was armed with night vision to see inside the submersible hatch. Five people were aboard the ship and the Coast Guard seized approximately 17,000 pounds of cocaine (7 tonnes), valued at $ 232 million, the spokesman said.

semi-submersible

The west coast of Colombia has many rivers that cross the jungle and flow into the Pacific Ocean, facilitating the construction of clandestine shipyards, hard to discover. In 2000, the police discovered a submarine still under construction. He would have measured 32 meters and would have been able to submerge 100 meters. This attribute is not common in many "narcosubmarinos" who can only navigate in immersion, because they have a combustion engine. Applied technology has evolved to produce safer and faster ships. They have a structure and cover fiberglbad and a diesel engine. They are able to carry about 10 tons of cocaine over 3,200 kilometers. Since they are fiberglbad and they move just below the surface, it is very difficult to detect them by visual or radar means. Some have paint that blocks infrared light.