A Royal Navy warship has made a significant dent in drug trafficking operations by confiscating over a tonne of cocaine, valued at more than £140 million.
This impressive haul was the result of two separate operations in the Caribbean Sea.
Portsmouth-based HMS Dauntless took the lead in these missions. The warship initially intercepted a drugs-running go-fast boat, from which they seized 1,230kg of cocaine. “… deploying her Wildcat helicopter, Royal Marines and a US Coast Guard team to stop and search the smugglers’ boat,” a press release detailed.
A second operation saw the Type 45 destroyer using its advanced sensors, typically employed to detect incoming hostile jets and missiles, to monitor a suspicious aircraft from Venezuela. This led to the capture of an additional 550kg of cocaine.
The press release stated this marked a “… notable first for a Type 45 destroyer, with Dauntless using her state-of-the-art sensors… to track the flight of the suspect aircraft for authorities on the ground to intercept.”
One officer from HMS Dauntless, who remains anonymous for security reasons, coordinated this operation and commented on the ship’s versatile capabilities. The officer remarked:
“It shows that not only are we able to disrupt the flow of drugs at sea but have the ability to sense and track air traffic, suspected of transporting drugs.”
HMS Dauntless’ main mission in the Caribbean Sea extends beyond thwarting drug traffickers. The ship is also deployed to offer support to British Overseas Territories during the hurricane season, which spans from June to November.
So what happens to the drugs?
They hold a party onboard of course!
Is that Robert or Deebee on the left and a very good friend on the right 😂
https://frankstaylorfamilyandroyalnavyhistory.net/HMSDauntless/HMSDauntlessCrossingTheEquator_files/image003.jpg
😂😂 but seriously, what DOES happen to the drugs? Stoned Dolphins?
Delivered on shore upon their return I would assume to claim the bounty!
The thin white line. 😂😂😂
They are destroyed on return to shore. Analysed first, to try and figure out the source and manufacture technique.
Thanks Robert and other gents
👍
😎
Morning Daniele. 13 degrees feels like 11 in Durban today!
Morning my friend. Storming start in the Rugby for the Boks.
Indeed Daniele but they had me worried up to start of the 2nd half! Someone must have had a word! Also England my England with 14 men thumped the Argies 😃
One of our best performances given the circumstances. Who needs tries? Just keep drop goaling it was clearly pissing them off and they lost their heads.
Lovely to see.
😅 😂
For ones seized in the Gulf they are washed overboard. Wheelie bin with holes in the bottom hung over the back end with a running fire hose in it. Empty the packages into the bin and its washed overboard. The packaging which is plastic is retained onboard ( Marpol!) and ditched shore side as HAZMAT waste.
I have had to arrange disposal of such hamzat for ships before…its “interesting” filling out the paperwork to include things as “may contain meth amphetamine/ heroin/ cocaine residue”
Wow.
Well done the RN! At a time when war with Russia may be quite conceivably imminent and the politicians are strapped for money, I thought it might be of interest to establish approximately how many RAF Typhoon aircraft would be immediately available. Using purely open source information, of course. Typhoon is a fifth-generation combat warplane with fully digital, integrated aircraft, avionics and weapon systems. Typhoon was built to perform at least five air missions: air superiority, air interdiction, suppression of enemy air defence, close air support and maritime attack. The aircraft is designed to carry 6 x medium-range and 2… Read more »
I think David. The RAF has a very good handle on Typhoon availability. And asking how many Typhoons are available today, is about as relevant as people comparing the the size of the Army to stadium capacities. The Typhoon fleet is meeting all its takings and commitments and more. Op Shader, NATO operations from Estonian (just finished) Falklands, and North/South QRA, and a full exercise program. Airframe availability changes every day. But they do have a required forward fleet number that has to be available, and depth maintenance is planned well in advance to maintain the required forward fleet. If… Read more »
Hi Robert. I have seen many youtube videos of Typhoon activity at Conningsby. However very few of them seem to feature the original T1 twin seat trainer version. The RAF retired 16 twoseat T1 trainers to save £1 billion in operating costs. in 2019. The plan to dismantle the aircraft and harvest spare parts for use on the remainder of the Typhoon fleet were revealed to Janes on 29 Jan 2018 by RAF Air Command at High Wycombe, in response to a Freedom of Information (FOI) Act request. The project, known as Reduce to Produce (RTP), aimed to generate £50… Read more »
Modern simulators are very capable. And the full range of capabilites can be practiced in the sim, networking of crews and aircraft together from other stations. Two seat Typhoon will be around for a while yet. But with the potential future fleet being single seat only Tempest/F35. The training has to look how it moves away from two seat aircraft.
Hi David, this link will give you an idea of how technological advances are making a real difference in maintaining the RAF Typhoon fleet. “Even before introducing new technology, we have been able to reduce the maintenance hours per flying hours by 30 per cent over the past decade or more. But there is still plenty to go at because Typhoon is going to be around for at least another 25 years.” Chris also says there is another before, too. And that is that just as Typhoon is sometimes referred to as a flying test bed for the planned future… Read more »
Hi Nigel – yes good link, thanks. I am sure that we have a superb aircraft in the Typhoon but the issue is, I think, attrition in a high intensity war situation. We seem to have very little in the way of a reserve and especially trained pilots.
No matter how good the aircraft is, one of the lessons of the UkR war is that warplanes will be lost and especially where neither side appears to be able to achieve air superiority. Due to MANPADS and air defence systems as I’m sure you will be aware
I most certainly am David!
Oh Dear,
Someone, somewhere in Venezuela is going to be hanging up by chains in a warehouse, staring at a chainsaw coming at them, for losing a large shipment like that.
It was probably the decoy shipment. The real 10 got through. They put bundles of lower quality or stuff messed up a bit in refining giving that an obvious route in compared to the other shipments. Out of 10 shipments it only needs 1 to get through to cover costs and make money. It lets the feds think they are doing a great job. At no point do these hauls ever effect supply at the destination. That $140m worth was probably worth $250k at the most to the person who put it on. Still if it’s war on drugs has… Read more »
Wouldn’t a River class be better suited to this sort of work? Using a a 7300-ton AAW Destroyer for drug smuggler interdiction seems a bit like overkill.
Dauntless is there for several reasons, and right now HMS Medway isn’t.
However a River’s Terma Scantar radar is limited to 100 miles and might not have been able to track the aircraft in the same way as Dauntless’s S1850M, which can track to 250 miles. And Medway doesn’t get a helicopter, so it has to work harder to capture the fast craft.
You would think the US is totally monitoring the airspace too.
Why?
All warships have secondary roles and tasking. Boarding and Search teams is just one of them. Disaster relief, Aid to shipping in distress, SAR all get done onboard. Whilst on a T23 I was 2i/c of the Board and Search team doing over 50 boardings in 3 months.
Variety is the spice of life.
Yes, I understand, I know on this website we are always complaining about the lack of ‘fighting’ ship hulls available. My reasoning is that Dauntless would be better off used to monitor the Russian activity right now.
Slightly off topic, have a re-read of the Navy Lookout article on enhancing the 5 Batch 2 River Class OPV’s. i know this has been discussed here before but if the frigate fleet is in such a dire state, surely a relatively inexpensive upgrade as OPV Plus might make sense- a 40mm Bofors Mark 4, reposition the 30mm and add one more on the other side, an armable drone, and a small hangar to accommodate same. If the 23’s start to quickly expire before the 26 and 31 Calvary arrive, these at least provide some partial relief at a reasonable… Read more »
👍Plus a very welcome addition albeit a tad late!
Crowsnest ASaC achieves IOC11 SEPTEMBER 2023
The UK Royal Navy (RN) has achieved initial operating capability (IOC) for its much-delayed Crowsnest airborne surveillance and control (ASaC) capability.
LINK
Interesting. Navy Lookout has the IOC date as back in July. But yes. It’s great news.
I’m a fan of the OPV max design from the Navy Lookout article, I thought 3 of the 5 batch 2s could be upgraded in this way to enhance their operational function and remit, it’s something that could be done now. The recurring conversation of OPV lethality and defensive capabilities comes up all the time on this site, so apologies for mentioning, but maybe shows how frustrated people feel about it.
Agree Wasp. The basic build is to a high standard. As some of the more knowledgeable contributors on this site point out, it will never be a proper warship could provide a somewhere in-between capability to at least fill in for some of the capability loss due to the fading of the Type 23’s. Also whilst we will never get back to building Liberty ships at so many a week, surely the government could speed up the Type 31 programme to ease this situation. Amazing things were done in 1982 in upgrading hardware and speeding up deliveries. I think of… Read more »
Interestingly I understand that the value of the drugs once seized can be added to our GDP – well if they are seized in the country,not too sure how it works in this situation.
Something to do with the fact that in countries where the drugs are legal it counts towards their GDP – so the same fiscal rules apply when we ‘aquire’ them.
Thats my understanding anyway- I stand to be corrected as I CBA to look it up
The RN provides the platform but the legal side is the US Coast Guard as the Yanks need it. We always had a major warship out there in the past (WIGS) which was a plus for the service and the matelots . Providing a presence to the islands we still care for and a much better set of run’s ashore than in the Gulf for the crew. More of it so future sailors will join up. Up Arm the Rivers? What a thought, but more than capable to do so and there is space to add some big bang missiles… Read more »
If you count it as a training exercise then fine, but realistically £140m worth of drugs is a dip in the ocean compared to the hundreds of billions being moved a year. Drug runners probably have written it off as expected losses.
Unless the drugs can be recycled, they are of zero value; they might have been worth something to an American buyer.
So, if we are using this area as a training area for ‘swarms’ of small boats, drones and planes, then what an opportunity, which begs the question, if the ABs are so great, why aren’t the Americans using their own Navy to gain practice and shut down the trade in drugs…? Hmm.