Really Bad Week for Cartel Cocaine Smugglers Along US Borders

18,000 + Pounds of Cocaine Seized Off US Coasts & Southern Border

Coast Guard crewmen from the USCG Cutter Kimball close in on six smugglers with a large load of cocaine in the Pacific Ocean (March 4, 2025). Photo from US Customs & Border Protection

Last week was a very bad one for cartel smugglers bound for the US with large loads of cocaine.

Let's start in Miami - where the crew of the US Coast Guard Cutter "Valiant" returned with a huge load of confiscated cocaine from six separate seizures during a recent patrol of the Caribbean Sea.

The drugs weighed in at 12,000 pounds of cocaine with a street value of $141 million dollars.

Pallets of cocaine line the deck of the US Coast Guard Cutter Valiant on its return from a Caribbean Patrol to Miami last week. (Photo from: US Southern Command)

Elsewhere in the Caribbean, US Border Patrol Agents and Homeland Security Investigators recovered 315 pounds of cocaine after a Puerto Rico Police Department Maritime Unit (FURA) spotted suspicious bundles floating near the shoreline of Cabo Rojo.

315 pounds of cocaine recovered in the Caribbean near the shoreline of Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico (US Border Patrol Photo)

On Tuesday, March 4, 2025, a US Customs & Border Protection aircraft patrolling the Pacific Ocean spotted a suspicious boat and notified the nearby Coast Guard Cutter Kimball, which moved in to investigate.

As small boat crews neared the boat, six men aboard it began tossing items overboard that were found to be bricks of cocaine. All aboard the boat were arrested -- and 6,000 pounds of cocaine (aboard the boat and in the water) were seized. The street value of these drugs is more than $70 million dollars.

View from a CBP Patrol aircraft as USCG crews intercept a smuggling vessel and recover bricks of cocaine tossed overboard (March 4, 2025) Photo from US Customs & Border Protection

Back on dry land, US Customs & Border Protection (CBP) Agents also racked up a significant cocaine seizure along the US Southern Border. On Wednesday, March 5, 2025, CBP officers assigned to the Pharr International Bridge in South Texas took a closer look at a tractor-trailer hauling a shipment of plastic wrap into the country from Northern Mexico.

Inside the trailer, they discovered 150 packages of cocaine weighing in at almost 171 pounds. The estimated street value of the drugs is more than $6 million dollars.

$6 million dollar load of cocaine was discovered inside a tractor-trailer crossing into Pharr, Texas from Reynosa, Mexico (March 5, 2025). Photo by US Customs & Border Protection

Is enough being done to deter illegal smuggling activities along US Borders?

Share your opinion in the comments on this article!

Abrazos,

Jack Beavers

Jack Beavers - US Border News