Spanish authorities have arrested three people who are suspected of retrieving cocaine from the sea chest of a merchant ship off the coast of Las Palmas. It is the latest in a long string of drug busts in and around the Canary Islands, a region often used as a transfer point for the South America to Europe cocaine supply chain.
Spain’s Guardia Civil suspected that a commercial harbor supply boat – routinely used to transfer stores to vessels at anchor off Las Palmas – might be involved in illicit activities. During an inspection, officers uncovered a large suitcase with multiple packets of cocaine in it. This discovery prompted a more thorough search of the vessel, and the officers turned up a cache of diving equipment in the hold – the kind of gear that one would need for accessing a ship’s hull for smuggling purposes. All three crewmembers from the supply boat were arrested.
After finding the gear, a special unit of the Guardia Civil deployed to inspect the anchored merchant vessel where the crew of the supply boat allegedly retrieved the cocaine. A dive team found another black wrapped package of cocaine bricks in the vessel’s sea chest.
