Large cross-border tunnel found linking Tijuana, San Diego

SAN DIEGO (AP) — U.S. authorities on Monday introduced the discovery of a major drug smuggling tunnel — working about the length of a six football fields — from Mexico to a warehouse in an industrial area in the U.S.

The key passage from Tijuana to San Diego featured rail and air flow programs, electrical energy and reinforced walls, authorities said. It was found near San Diego’s Otay Mesa border crossing in an area where more than a dozen different subtle tunnels have been discovered within the final twenty years.

U.S. authorities mentioned it was unknown how long the tunnel had been operating and what amount of drugs, if any, bought by undetected. They seized 1,762 kilos (799 kg) of cocaine, 165 kilos (75 kg) of meth and three.5 pounds (1.6 kg) of heroin in connection with 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 probably the most fortified stretches of the border, illustrating the restrictions of border partitions. While thought of efficient in opposition to small, crudely built tunnels known as “gopher holes,” walls aren't any match for extra sophisticated passages that run deeper underground.

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

The kind of medication seized might signal a shift from the multi-ton loads of marijuana that had been often found in discoveries before California legalized pot for leisure use in 2019.

Onerous medicine, equivalent to heroin, methamphetamine and fentanyl, are typically smuggled by official border crossings from Mexico because their small size and lack of odor make them tough to detect. But tunnels give smugglers an advantage of being able to carry huge hundreds at lightning pace.

The tunnel exited the US 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 house that was not too long ago used to stash medicine, officers began making visitors stops of autos that had been there or at a warehouse close to the border, turning up packing containers filled with cocaine, in response to a federal legal criticism filed in San Diego.

They raided the properties — discovering no other medicine at the warehouse, however a tunnel opening carved into the cement floor, federal prosecutors stated.

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

Many tunnels, including the one announced Monday, are in San Diego’s Otay Mesa industrial space, the place clay-like soil is conducive to digging and warehouses provide cowl.

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

Authorities declined to link the newest tunnel to any specific cartel. They claimed victory despite not figuring out how lengthy it had been operating.

“There is no such thing as a more light on the finish 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 maintain illicit medication from reaching our streets and destroying our households and communities.”

By federal regulation, U.S. authorities should fill the U.S. facet of tunnels with concrete after they're discovered.

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Related Press writer Eugene Johnson in Seattle contributed.