Spanish police have made their largest-ever cocaine seizure on the high seas, intercepting a Europe-bound container ship with almost 10 tonnes of cocaine hidden in salt.
Officers from the Special Operations Group (GEO) boarded the merchant vessel on the Atlantic Ocean en route from Brazil to Europe and located 9,994 kilograms of cocaine concealed in a shipment of salt, police said on Monday.
During the operation, the 13 crew members were arrested, and 294 bales of the drug and a handgun were seized.
The vessel, which ended up running out of fuel, had to be towed to port by coastguards in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Canary Islands.
Footage showed police officers using shovels and digging with their hands to remove cocaine from beneath the salt, and then forming a line to move the bales to the pier.
The international effort, codenamed White Tide, also involved the Maritime Analysis and Operations Centre (MAOC), the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Brazil’s Federal Police, Britain’s National Crime Agency and authorities in France and Portugal.
The seizure is the largest maritime cocaine bust since 1999, when police intercepted the Tammsaare carrying 7,500kg of cocaine in its bow and dismantled a vast Spanish-Colombian drug-smuggling network. The drugs were brought to Las Palmas in the Canary Islands, where they were burnt in huge ovens in a military compound.