Colombia's 100-foot drug-smuggling submarine

Deep in the South American jungle, cocaine traffickers get amphibious

Best Opinion:  MSNBC, Wall St. Journal

The video: Last weekend, authorities in southwest Colombia seized a 100-foot fiberglass submarine meant to transport massive amounts of cocaine.  The fiberglass sub, capable of plunging nine meters below the water's surface, cost an estimated $2.12 million to build and can transport eight tons of drugs and four drug runners at a time. According to authorities, the sub was being prepped for a maiden voyage to the coast of Mexico before it was discovered. It's unclear exactly who owns the sub, though one general theorized that "narco-traffickers coupled with narco-terrorists" were likely culprits. Semi-submersible vessels have been used by traffickers for years, but this is the first fully operational submarine to surface. 
The reaction: It's hard to envision a drug-smuggling operation with the "skill and organization" to operate a "complex and dangerous" submarine, but "maybe we underestimate them," says Robert Hood at MSNBC. As such, this likely won't be the last technological innovation we see from inventive smugglers, says Admiral Hernando Will of Colombia's Navy of the Pacific, as quoted by The Wall Street Journal. "First came the semi-submersible, now the fully-submersibles... and next will be remote-controlled subs." Check out the cocaine-hauling submarine:

 

 

 

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