Officials intercepted an enormous amount of cocaine in the Pacific Ocean. Photo: New Zealand Police
When it comes to cocaine, three tons is a lot. Three tons is a lot of anything, really, but especially cocaine. Three tons of cocaine is enough to supply the Australian market for about a year. Three tons of cocaine is worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $316 million USD. And three tons of cocaine is what New Zealand Police found floating in the Pacific Ocean a few days ago. Three-and-half tons, to be a little more exact.
New Zealand Police Commissioner Andrew Coster told reporters that the cocaine was found at a “floating transit point” and consisted of 81 packages. After it was deployed to the area last week, the Royal New Zealand Navy vessel HMNZS Manawanui intercepted the drugs and picked them up. It appears that officials had prior knowledge of where the cocaine would be, although they’re keeping that quiet for now.
“We believe there was enough cocaine to service the Australian market for about one year, and this would be more than New Zealand would use in 30 years,” Coster said. “This is one of the single biggest seizures of illegal drugs by authorities in this country.”
The drugs were marked with different symbols. Photo: New Zealand Police
Officials said it’s likely that the cocaine was bound for Australia, where the price of coke is high. It’s believed that the drugs were dropped there by an international drug-smuggling syndicate, which is a good bet considering that only an international drug smuggling syndicate would have 3.5 tons of cocaine to drop in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
“The sheer scale of this seizure is estimated to have taken more than half a billion dollars’ worth [New Zealand dollars] of cocaine out of circulation,” said New Zealand Customs Service Acting Controller Bill Perry.
Although no arrests have been made, police said that the seizure will deal a strong blow (pun intended, thank you very much), to the producers of the drugs. After the they were picked up by the Navy vessel, they were taken back to New Zealand and destroyed.
The find was part of a joint operation called “Operation Hydros.” The police, customs, and military worked with unnamed international partner agencies to “identify and monitor the movements of suspicious vessels.”
Since 3.5 tons of cocaine isn’t generally found floating in the ocean, the New Zealand Customs Service believes that it might be evidence that smugglers are trying new ways to get their product to the market.
“While this disrupts the syndicate’s operations,” Coster said, “we remain vigilant given the lengths we know these groups will go to circumvent coming to law enforcement’s attention.”
