Forty million pounds of cocaine have been seized by RFA Mounts Bay and a US Coastguard team south of the US Virgin Islands.
According to the Royal Navy, they seized 1.4 tonnes of illegal narcotics – which turned out to be cocaine, worth more than £35m. The traffickers managed to ditch 150kg of drugs in the Caribbean before they were intercepted – ensuring another £3.75m of cocaine won’t be sold.
“Thanks to the work of the Royal Navy and our US partners these narcotics will not reach the streets and fuel further criminality,” said Armed Forces Minister Anne-Marie Trevelyan.
“RFA Mounts Bay has had a varied deployment, from leading the response to Hurricane Dorian to stopping the illicit drugs trade. This is a timely reminder of the diverse work undertaken by our Armed Forces that helps keep us safe.”
According to the release:
“It’s the second bust in a week scored by UK Naval forces; just a few days ago HMS Defender captured £1m of cannabis from a dhow on the Hash Highway in the Middle East. Mounts Bay has been on counter-drugs patrol since the beginning of the year, taking part in a combined UK-US-French operation, Carib Royale.
Aboard the Falmouth-based ship is a specialist board-and-search team of US Coastguard personnel – the Law Enforcement Detachment – and their MH65 helicopter. That helicopter was on a patrol when it came across a ‘go-fast’ craft – typical of those used by smugglers in the region. Mounts Bay changed course to intercept and once within close range, sent the Coastguard detachment across to stop the craft and seize its cargo.”
The boarding team found 44 large bales of cocaine – and learned from the five-strong crew that they had succeeded in jettisoning 150kg, about one tenth of their cargo, before they were halted in the tracks.
Do the crew get to split the proceeds as in salvage. Would be a great posting and improve RN recruitment if they did. It’s what we need post-Brexit….a little bit of Raleigh’s entrepreneurship! 🙂
Oh, and a big Hurrah for Boris and the HS2 decission!
I agree H, it’s a brave decision but one that in 50-60 yrs will be appreciated, if not just yet. I do wish they would compensate better though – I’ve read some terrible stories about people have lost their livelihoods. I know it was largely political rather than for infrastructure/planning purposes, but a good call all the same.
Now a few quid for the defence budget please
Agreed…the government has admitted that ‘customer relations’ on this project have been less than ideal….for some elderly people this could prove very distressing! That said, the failure of real investment in the transport infrastructure of this country has been pretty woeful. We need joined up government and political consensus to promote a rolling programme of projects that prevents the laying off of engineers and people with core skills. HS2 should be envisioned as part of a bigger network that terminates in the two great Scottish cities. Borrowing money for capital construction projects is easier these days than explaining defence needs to the public. Perhaps the Daily Mail could help out here….they have done an excellent job of slandering the EU and Corbyn, and getting Joe public to believe it!
SES get a very small piece of the HS2 pie, Hitachi get hundreds of millions. Hurrah. Climb Mt Nitaka why don’t you
?
apologies if I have wrong end of HS2 stick, I was led to believe it’sa shambles which gives Japan a lot of money, but very little for us.
Ah…you mean like defence contracts where all the money goes to British industry a la: C17, F35 etc etc ad nauseum!
We need high speed to Edinburgh or atleast Newcastle, the Chinese can do thousands of miles of high speed in a few years and are still doing thousands of miles and we find it hard to get a hundred odd miles built.
I expect that the red tape concerning civil liberties is not a factor in the PROC…as it wasn’t in C19th Britain when most our railway lines were built!
Endless legal wrangles, wildlife surveys, moving newts, frogs, lizards etc.
Yes, and as for health and safety! I wonder how many deaths per 100km the Chinese managed?
Does the MH65 or RFA Montego Bay, I mean Mount Bay make the claim? RFA are civilians with “freedom of passage”.
This is why we don’t need a RAF. The RN can do all this. The Army can handle the C-130 and Chinooks, Navy can do everything else. You may deem me to be insane, but what really do we need the RAF for, except to fly a Lancaster around Cumbria once a year?
Has there ever been a discussion on here along the lines of Army air wing and Navy air wing as a cost saving measure.
Yes. On dozens of occasions.
It ain’t broke, so don’t fix it.
Wouldn’t it just make more sense to either decriminalise drug taking or just legalise it, full stop.
Making sense is not electorally worth while….
Legal cocaine – that’s a hell of a step up when medicinal cannabis is almost impossible to get!
Yeah that’s a mission to hell legalising coke, it’ll be cheap and kids and everything will be on it…
The Association of Chief Police officers (22) conducted a 6 year survey before David Cameron’s successful election as PM. It concluded that the US asked us to join the “war on drugs” and that we had cancelled a previous policy.
They recommended that we decriminalize, licence and monitor drug use. In 2009/2010, the survey was completed and submitted the Conservatives immediately threw it in the bin. Source: TheGuardian.
You could add a radioactive isotope to cocaine shipments and then follow the trail to the Mr big’s and test noses with detectors !
well done on finding the £40m drug horde lads, make sure you hand in that £20m haul into the port authorities and get back home sharpish for you finding a £10m drugs stash medal
Shame we can’t sell it and invest the money back into the ship?
“Forty million pounds of cocaine” When I first read this I thought it meant in weight. haah
I applaud the democratic principles of UKDefenceJournal publishing this story. Despite #Windrush drug deportations to Jamaica this week, our Prime Minister Boris Johnson has confessed to using Class A Cocaine or “cake” as Tories pronounce it.
Little bit of egg on face there. Brave men risking their lives to smash “cake”, while the PM admits to stuffing it up his nose, yet continues to deport people for the same offence two decades earlier. I feel really sorry for you guys.
Henry Root…now there’s a name to conjure with! I am old enough to remember his wonderful letters being broadcast on radio4…very funny. Henry Root was the ‘nom de plume’ of writer and satirist Charlie Donaldson who liked to mock establishment figures in the ‘Private Eye manner. Unfortunately, Charlie is no longer with us but, we appear to have a replacement on UKDJ. Trouble is Henry, Charlie was both funny and clever…you are not either! Your choice of nom de plume is as self-congratulatory and pompous as mine!
We should deport every non brit for crimes and being scum
So I assume we will see an MH65 operating from HMS Medway?
Shame if you like that kind of stuff up the nose. But great for the RFA, I thought it was Duncan.
I can see dodgy navys not declaring drug busts and keeping the lot even the boat it’s in.