Large cross-border tunnel discovered linking Tijuana, San Diego

SAN DIEGO (AP) — U.S. authorities on Monday announced the discovery of a significant drug smuggling tunnel — operating concerning the length of a six soccer fields — from Mexico to a warehouse in an industrial space in the U.S.

The key passage from Tijuana to San Diego featured rail and air flow systems, electrical energy and bolstered partitions, authorities said. It was discovered near San Diego’s Otay Mesa border crossing in an area the place more than a dozen other sophisticated tunnels have been found within the last 20 years.

U.S. authorities stated it was unknown how long the tunnel had been working and what amount of medicine, if any, got via undetected. They seized 1,762 kilos (799 kg) of cocaine, 165 kilos (75 kg) of meth and three.5 kilos (1.6 kg) of heroin in reference to the investigation.

Six individuals, ages 31 to 55, were charged with conspiring to distribute cocaine. All are Southern California residents.

The tunnel is in one of the vital fortified stretches of the border, illustrating the restrictions of border walls. Whereas thought-about efficient towards small, crudely constructed tunnels called “gopher holes,” partitions are not any match for more refined passages that run deeper underground.

The most recent passage, found Friday, ran one-third of a mile (532 m) to Tijuana. It was 4 toes (1.2 m) in diameter and about six tales deep.

The kind of drugs seized might signal a shift from the multi-ton a great deal of marijuana that had been often present in discoveries earlier than California legalized pot for leisure use in 2019.

Exhausting drugs, equivalent to heroin, methamphetamine and fentanyl, are sometimes smuggled through official border crossings from Mexico as a result of their small dimension and lack of odor make them difficult to detect. However tunnels give smugglers an advantage of being able to carry enormous hundreds at lightning speed.

The tunnel exited the USA in a nondescript warehouse named “Amistad Park” on a road that's busy with massive semitrailers in the course of the day but quiet at night. On Monday, armed guards watched over a small shaft with a ladder that descended into the tunnel.

After staking out a home that was recently used to stash drugs, officers began making traffic stops of automobiles that had been there or at a warehouse near the border, turning up bins full of cocaine, in keeping with a federal felony criticism filed in San Diego.

They raided the properties — discovering no different medicine at the warehouse, however 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 area, the place clay-like soil is conducive to digging and warehouses provide cover.

The cross-border passages date again to the early 1990s and have been used primarily to smuggle multi-ton loads of marijuana. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration stated in 2020 that they are generally present in California and Arizona and related to Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel.

Authorities declined to link the most recent tunnel to any particular cartel. They claimed victory regardless of not understanding how long it had been working.

“There is no such thing as a extra light on the end of this narco-tunnel,” mentioned Randy Grossman, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of California. “We will take down every subterranean smuggling route we discover to maintain illicit medication 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're found.

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Associated Press writer Eugene Johnson in Seattle contributed.