Huge cross-border tunnel discovered linking Tijuana, San Diego

SAN DIEGO (AP) — U.S. authorities on Monday announced the invention of a serious drug smuggling tunnel — running in regards to the size of a six football fields — from Mexico to a warehouse in an industrial area within the U.S.

The secret passage from Tijuana to San Diego featured rail and ventilation methods, electricity and strengthened partitions, authorities mentioned. It was discovered near San Diego’s Otay Mesa border crossing in an area the place greater than a dozen different refined tunnels have been discovered in the last twenty years.

U.S. authorities stated it was unknown how long the tunnel had been operating and what amount of medication, if any, bought by undetected. They seized 1,762 pounds (799 kg) of cocaine, 165 pounds (75 kg) of meth and three.5 pounds (1.6 kg) of heroin in connection with the investigation.

Six folks, ages 31 to 55, have been charged with conspiring to distribute cocaine. All are Southern California residents.

The tunnel is in probably the most fortified stretches of the border, illustrating the constraints of border partitions. While thought-about efficient against small, crudely constructed tunnels known as “gopher holes,” walls are not any match for more sophisticated passages that run deeper underground.

The latest passage, discovered Friday, ran one-third of a mile (532 m) to Tijuana. It was 4 feet (1.2 m) in diameter and about six stories deep.

The type of drugs seized may sign a shift from the multi-ton loads of marijuana that had been typically present in discoveries earlier than California legalized pot for leisure use in 2019.

Hard drugs, corresponding to heroin, methamphetamine and fentanyl, are usually smuggled by way of official border crossings from Mexico as a result of their small measurement and lack of odor make them troublesome to detect. However tunnels give smugglers a bonus of being able to carry enormous hundreds at lightning velocity.

The tunnel exited the United States in a nondescript warehouse named “Amistad Park” on a street that's busy with large semitrailers throughout the day however quiet at night time. On Monday, armed guards watched over a small shaft with a ladder that descended into the tunnel.

After staking out a house that was recently used to stash medication, officers started making visitors stops of automobiles that had been there or at a warehouse near the border, turning up boxes stuffed with cocaine, in keeping with a federal felony criticism filed in San Diego.

They raided the properties — finding no different medicine at the warehouse, but a tunnel opening carved into the cement floor, federal prosecutors said.

Authorities have discovered about 15 sophisticated tunnels on California’s border with Mexico since 2006.

Many tunnels, together with the one introduced Monday, are in San Diego’s Otay Mesa industrial space, the place clay-like soil is conducive to digging and warehouses present cowl.

The cross-border passages date again to the early Nineties and have been used primarily to smuggle multi-ton loads of marijuana. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration mentioned in 2020 that they're typically present in California and Arizona and related to Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel.

Authorities declined to link the latest tunnel to any particular cartel. They claimed victory regardless of not realizing how lengthy it had been operating.

“There isn't any more light at the end of this narco-tunnel,” mentioned Randy Grossman, U.S. legal professional for the Southern District of California. “We are going to take down each subterranean smuggling route we find to keep illicit drugs from reaching our streets and destroying our families and communities.”

By federal regulation, U.S. authorities must fill the U.S. aspect of tunnels with concrete after they are found.

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Associated Press author Eugene Johnson in Seattle contributed.