U.S. authorities are continuing to encounter smuggling boats off American coasts, with gunfire reported during at least two recent incidents.
On Tuesday, September 9, 2025, US Customs & Border Protection (CBP) Agents assigned to the Caribbean Air and Marine Branch, along with the US Coast Guard (USCG), intercepted human smugglers in a dangerously overloaded boat off Puerto Rico. 66 Illegal Aliens (49 Dominican, 15 Haitian, and 2 Romanian) were apprehended without injury.
On Sunday, September 7, 2025, CBP Agents assigned to the San Diego Air and Marine Branch encountered a 30-foot boat in the Pacific Ocean, which was attempting to enter US waters with 13 Illegal Aliens aboard. The cartel human smuggler piloting the boat refused orders to stop for a boarding party and (unwisely) attempted to outrun the CBP patrol boat.
CBP Agents put a stop to that attempt by firing multiple rounds into the engine of the smuggling boat.
With his craft dead in the water, the smuggler wisely surrendered without further incident. The people he had been paid to ferry from Mexico to California were taken into custody.
During that same weekend in the Pacific Ocean, the crew of the USCG Cutter Stone encountered three cartel drug smuggling boats on the same night, resulting in the arrests of seven cartel smugglers and the seizure of 13,000 pounds of cocaine. The smuggling vessels were destroyed by gunfire and set ablaze until they sank after the smugglers and their drug loads had been offloaded.
These seizures are part of the Coast Guard's "Operation Pacific Viper," which has so far led to the arrests of more than 35 cartel smugglers and to the confiscation of more than 40,000 pounds of cartel cocaine.
How much damage do you think these operations have inflicted on cartel cocaine and human smuggling operations?
Share your thoughts in the comments to this article!
Abrazos,
Jack Beavers
