Huge cross-border tunnel discovered linking Tijuana, San Diego

SAN DIEGO (AP) — U.S. authorities on Monday announced the invention of a serious drug smuggling tunnel — running about the size of a six football fields — from Mexico to a warehouse in an industrial space within the U.S.

The key passage from Tijuana to San Diego featured rail and air flow techniques, electrical energy and bolstered partitions, authorities said. It was discovered near San Diego’s Otay Mesa border crossing in an area where more than a dozen different sophisticated tunnels have been discovered in the final two decades.

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

Six people, ages 31 to 55, have been 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 constraints of border walls. While thought of effective in opposition to small, crudely constructed tunnels referred to as “gopher holes,” walls are no match for more sophisticated passages that run deeper underground.

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

The type of medication seized could sign a shift from the multi-ton loads of marijuana that had been usually found in discoveries before California legalized pot for leisure use in 2019.

Arduous medication, reminiscent of heroin, methamphetamine and fentanyl, are usually smuggled through official border crossings from Mexico because their small size and lack of odor make them troublesome to detect. However tunnels give smugglers a bonus of with the ability to carry enormous masses at lightning pace.

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

After staking out a home that was not too long ago used to stash medicine, officers started making site visitors stops of vehicles that had been there or at a warehouse near the border, turning up boxes stuffed with cocaine, based on a federal prison grievance filed in San Diego.

They raided the properties — finding no different medicine on the warehouse, but a tunnel opening carved into the cement floor, federal prosecutors mentioned.

Authorities have found about 15 subtle tunnels on California’s border with Mexico since 2006.

Many tunnels, including the one introduced Monday, are in San Diego’s Otay Mesa industrial area, where clay-like soil is conducive to digging and warehouses present cowl.

The cross-border passages date again to the early 1990s and have been used primarily to smuggle multi-ton a great deal of marijuana. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration stated in 2020 that they're typically present in California and Arizona and associated with Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel.

Authorities declined to link the most recent tunnel to any specific cartel. They claimed victory regardless of not knowing how lengthy it had been working.

“There isn't a more mild at the end of this narco-tunnel,” stated Randy Grossman, U.S. legal professional for the Southern District of California. “We will take down every subterranean smuggling route we find to keep illicit drugs from reaching our streets and destroying our households and communities.”

By federal legislation, U.S. authorities must fill the U.S. facet of tunnels with concrete after they are discovered.

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Associated Press writer Eugene Johnson in Seattle contributed.