Smuggling Tube

This large metal tube was seized as part of an investigation into a transnational criminal organization smuggling cocaine from the Dominican Republic, Panama and Colombia to Puerto Rico. The organization’s members utilized a range of techniques to avoid detection by law enforcement including attaching the cocaine to the hulls of maritime vessels. Unsuspecting crews aboard these vessels often unknowingly move the drugs to their destinations.

On March 7, 2022, DEA agents received information indicating that a large amount of cocaine was attached to a cargo ship which departed the Dominican Republic and was scheduled to arrive in San Juan, Puerto Rico the following day. Early the next morning agents met with U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers as well as Homeland Security agents and boarded the suspected vessel.

DEA agents and Customs and Border Protection officers identified the tubes using an underwater drone. They located 2 parasitic devices containing a total of 131 bricks of cocaine weighing 160 kilograms. A dive team detached the devices and brought the cocaine to the agents for confiscation.

Click here to view this artifact’s episode of “Stories from the Collection,” a monthly video series on the DEA Museum’s most exciting objects.