Ecuador Seizes Drug-Running Super Submarine

Enlarge Jim Popkin

The kevlar-coated submarine, pictured at the naval command headquarters in Guayaquil, Ecuador, after Ecuadorian police found it in a remote jungle in July 2010.

Jim Popkin

The kevlar-coated submarine, pictured at the naval command headquarters in Guayaquil, Ecuador, after Ecuadorian police found it in a remote jungle in July 2010.

For years, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency heard rumors that drug cartels were building submarines to smuggle cocaine up the Pacific coast. Authorities did find primitive submersibles designed for one-way trips to Mexico, but the rumors spoke of something far more ambitious ? a full-sized "super sub" with the ability to make extensive round trips, carrying tons of cargo.

In July 2010, Ecuadorian authorities found such a vessel: a 74-foot long, fully functioning Kevlar-coated submarine, discovered in a remote swamp near the Colombian border.

"They built this without the use of electricity, bringing the parts in essentially by canoe-like boats, several at a time for over a year," Wired magazine's Jim Popkin tells NPR's Neal Conan.

"It can ride underwater for 18 hours at a clip," says Popkin. It had the capacity to haul up to nine million tons of cocaine, and, coated with Kevlar and carbon fiber it is difficult to track. "Like an old World War II sub, when it goes under, you can barely hear it," Popkin says. "... The cartels are willing to spend that kind of time and money, because at the end of the day, you can ship $250 million dollars worth of cocaine to ... Mexico, for transport into the U.S."

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/NprTopicsInterviews/~3/gjtw_fcOJRU/ecuador-seizes-drug-running-super-sub

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