On our border with Mexico, both drug smugglers and the CBP use them.
Predator drones operated by Customs and Border Protection.
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Ryan Lovelace 
As multi-billion-dollar international conglomerates intent on smuggling drugs, people, and other contraband across America’s southern border, drug cartels are always looking for the newest and best technology to help move their product. And the smugglers have come a long way from the days when border tunnels and small private planes were state-of-the-art. Their latest innovation: drones.
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A recent incident on the Mexican side of the United States’ southern border has shed new light on how drones are being used by both sides in the War on Drugs. Late last month a drone overloaded with meth crash-landed in a supermarket parking lot in Tijuana, Mexico, less than half a mile from the border, and was recovered by Mexican law-enforcement officials. The drone’s existence provides a rare glimpse of the constantly evolving tactics of transnational smugglers, and it also raises questions about the U.S. federal government’s surveillance of the border. The U.S. law-enforcement agencies in charge of policing the border claim to be ready for any threat posed by drones. But they also operate a poorly managed drone program of their own that has drawn heavy criticism from the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general.
Special Agent Matt Barden of the Drug Enforcement Agency says the DEA does not take the proliferation of drones lightly; along with its counterparts in Mexico, the agency is studying the crashed-drone incident. However, Barden adds that this is not the first time the DEA has discovered that drones have been used to move drugs undetected. “This is something that’s not new,” he explains. “We’ve heard about this, but more prominently with people trying to get a small amount of drugs or contraband into a prison or some confines of a locked or guarded facility — trying to get stuff in or out.”
The biggest concerns about cartel-operated drones, Barden says, have nothing to do with the actual movements of drugs. “Is it a good way to get some dope out of the woods or out of the jungle to a waiting car or vehicle? Yeah,” Barden says. “Better yet, to me personally, is it a better way to perform surveillance on law enforcement? Absolutely. That scares me a whole lot more than does the smuggling aspect of it.” He adds that if DEA agents encountered drones that could expose a confidential mission or jeopardize their safety, the agents would use discretion but would bring the drones down as swiftly as possible.
The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency, on the other hand, is downplaying concerns about the potential for growing use of unmanned aircraft at the border. “To date, U.S. Customs and Border Protection has not intercepted any drones smuggling narcotics across the borders into the United States,” CBP spokesman Carlos Lazo said in a statement. “In collaboration with our federal, state, local and international law enforcement partners, CBP remains vigilant against emerging trends and ever-changing tactics employed by transnational criminal organizations behind illegal attempts to smuggle narcotics into the U.S.”
Outwardly, the Border Patrol appears to be ready for drone-powered drug smugglers. Border Patrol agents would not comment on the counter-measures the agency might employ to combat drones that are threatening its agents or being used in the commission of crimes. But the Border Patrol has an arsenal of drones of its own. The agency’s Unmanned Aircraft System has a fleet of nine Predator B drones that can fly for 20 hours straight and travel at speeds up to 276 miles per hour to help secure the nation’s border. Predator B drones, which are also used by the military, are much more sophisticated and powerful than the drone that crashed in Mexico. The drug-smuggling drone was much smaller, slower, and less durable than the top-dollar equipment paid for by American taxpayers.
But while, on its face, the Border Patrol’s drone program gives the agency a firm technological advantage over the cartels, DHS’s inspector general recently concluded that the program has been poorly managed for several years. Near the end of last year, the IG issued a report saying that the Border Patrol could not prove that its program was effective, because the agency had failed over the last eight years to develop performance measures. The report revealed that the program cost nearly $10,000 more per hour of flying time than DHS claimed and that, while the Predator B drones were expected to fly over the border 16 hours a day, 365 days a year, the aircraft were actually airborne just over 3.5 hours a day on average. The Border Patrol agreed with the IG’s conclusions and recommendations in principle, but then issued its own report disagreeing with the findings.
When drones become the subject of bad news, as with the crash in Tijuana, the fledgling commercial drone industry suffers. Brendan Schulman, an attorney who leads the commercial-drone division of the New York–based law firm of Kramer Levin, says he is worried that misconceptions about drones could lead to stifling regulations.
“The use of drones by criminal enterprises is still a relatively new phenomenon, so while we’ve read the occasional story about drugs at the border or contraband being dropped behind prison walls, I think it’s still an unusual way to try to deliver contraband,” Schulman says. “This is still the early days of civilian drone technology and . . . what I hope we don’t see on a federal level is an overreaction.”
How federal and local law-enforcement officers plan to incorporate drones into their daily activities remains to be seen, but drone technology appears poised to become an integral part of protecting the nation’s borders — if the Border Patrol cleans up its act.
— Ryan Lovelace is a William F. Buckley Jr. Fellow at National Review.
From the days of rum-running during Prohibition, smugglers have used all manner of creative ways to spirit their cargos past law enforcement. Now drug traffickers may be adopting the latest modern marvel: remote-control drones. Here’s a look at some high-tech and far-fetched drug smuggling schemes.
The recent crash of a quadcopter drone on the White House lawn highlighted the growing security threat posed by the new high-tech toys, which are growing in popularity but posing new questions about privacy and airspace safety. Drug-carrying drones would be an alarming new aspect to the debate.
Earlier this month a quadcopter drone carrying more than six pounds of methamphetamine crashed in a supermarket parking lot near San Ysidro, Calif., on the Mexican border. Tijuana officials speculate the drone, a Spreading Wings S9000, crashed because it had been overloaded. It’s cargo was worth an estimated $40,000.
DEA special agent Matthew Barden speculates that, given their small carrying capacity, drones might have other uses for drug cartels, telling Time: “They can be used to spy on agents doing rounds… People can use them to set up an ambush.” Added Barden: “If it’s not happening, it soon will.”
Companies such as Amazon have recently experimented with using drones to delivery small packages to consumers, everything from prescription drugs to pizza and pastries.
The approach is still in its infancy, though, and faces uncertain regulatory oversight, especially in urban areas. Pictured, an experimental delivery drone operated by DHL.
The Domino’s Pizza “Domi-Copter” pizza delivery drone. (It might not ever deliver drugs, but it would be invaluable to cope with the ensuing munchies.)
BORDER BATTLE: Drones are also playing a growing role in border security enforcement. The Los Angeles Daily News reports that nearly half of the U.S.-Mexican border is now patrolled solely by drone aircraft such as MQ-9 Reapers, the same platform used by the Pentagon.
The drones primarily do not provide real-time monitoring but instead are used for “change detection,” sweeping over remote areas of the border over successive days to collect images that are analyzed for tiny changes that could indicate footprints, tire tracks, or other evidence of human activity.
According to the Daily News, the border patrol has flown around 10,000 “change detection” flights since the program began in March 2013, covering some 900 miles of the U.S.-Mexican border, mainly in Texas. Most flights originate at Fort Huachuca in Arizona.
Earlier this month a report from the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general found the drone patrol program ineffective — operating just 22% of its planned patrols — and costing five times as much as was reported. The report recommended requested funding increases be directed elsewhere.
SMUGGLING SCHEMES: Driven by huge profit potential, drug smugglers have resorted to sometimes outlandish schemes to transport their illegal cargoes, from tunnels to submarines capable of carrying millions of dollars worth of drugs.
Drug Subs: When drug agents got too good at spotting and capturing boats, the smugglers went underwater. Colombian authorities captured this submarine owned and operated by drug cartels in Timbiqui. The submersible was capable of carrying eight tons of cocaine from Colombia to distributors in Mexico.
The legendary drug-smuggling submarine dubbed “Bigfoot” is now on display at Naval Air Station Key West in Florida. Captured in 2006, the 49-foot craft carried a four-man crew and three tons of cocaine.
A drug-sub captured in Ecuador in 2010. Costing less than $1 million to build, they can move cargo valued at more than $150 million for each load.
A fiberglass submersible intercepted by the Coast Guard in 2007. According to a New York Times article, some 70 such subs were thought to carry as much as 30% of cocaine exports from Colombia in 2009.
Colombian Navy troopers guard a diesel-powered semi-submersible craft used by drug smugglers in 2012.
Ultralights: Drug enforcement officials first began seeing these small airplanes used by smugglers in 2008 to ferry loads as large as 250 pounds. Pictured, a crashed ultralight discovered near Albuquerque, N.M., in 2011, with it’s load of marijuana bundles still attached.
Because they are easily spotted in daylight, they often to fly at night, using roads or lighted temporary runways to navigate. This ultralight seized by federal agents in 2008 near Tucson, Ariz., carried 253 pounds of marijuana.
Difficult to detect on radar, ultralights have been involved in near collisions with civilian and military aircraft. This drug-smuggling ultralight crashed into a field north of San Luis, Ariz., in 2008. The pilot’s body was found still in the wreckage.
Catapult: In 2011 Mexican troops discovered jury-rigged catapults that had been used to fling parcels of marijuana from the the border city of Agua Prieta over a 21-foot-tall fence into Arizona. Smugglers reportedly drove the catapult on the back of an SUV. Fox News Latino reports the troops seized 1.4 tons of marijuana along with the catapults.
Pot Cannon: This pneumatic cannon carried on the back of a pickup truck used compressed carbon dioxide cartridges to fling packages weighing around two pounds some 500 feet. Border agents became aware of the device after finding more than 30 canisters of marijuana in a field near the Mexican border.
A small hand-held pneumatic “tee-shirt cannon” of the type used during sporting events was also used by smugglers along the Arizona border.
Coffins: In the 1970s, Harlem heroin kingpin Frank Lucas boasted of spiriting his drugs from suppliers in Asia’s Golden Triangle inside the coffins of dead American servicemen arriving from Vietnam. Though this claim is contested, it was dramatized in the 2007 film American Gangster.
Plush Dolls: In 2006 DEA officials busted a drug smuggling operation headquartered in Greeley, Colo., that had used children’s dolls including the Sesame Street character Elmo (pictured) to transport highly purified methamphetamine. During the raid authorities seized more than 50 pounds of meth with a street value of up to $2.4 million.
Tunnels: Drug smugglers have been tunneling under the U.S.-Mexican border for the last several decades, many originating in Tijuana, Mexico and ending up in San Diego, Calif. The tunnels range from Great Escape-style crawlways to hallway-sized corridors complete with lights and air conditioning.
A two-story electric elevator services this drug tunnel connected warehouses in Tijuana, Mexico and Otay Mesa, Calif.
HIDDEN PRIZES: Smugglers have tried to hide their contraband in every conceivable (and sometimes inconceivable) hiding place to sneak them past customs inspectors at airports and ports of entry. Here’s a look at some of the more outlandish attempts intercepted by authorities.
Drug smuggling through the U.S.-Mexico border often parallels the trafficking of illegal immigrants, where people are hidden inside every possible empty space in a vehicle, from trunks to engine compartments to, in this unsuccessful 2006 attempt, the inside of a chair.
In September 2011 authorities at Dulles International Airport discovered 15 bags of cocaine hidden inside clams carried by a smuggler arriving from Panama. The five ounces of cocaine had a street value of $10,000.
Texas police intercepted a shipment of cocaine in 2006 that was molded to look like the distinctive curved Pringles potato chip.
These bottles of illegal liquid steroids impounded in Australia were hidden inside sexual lubricant packages.
This Mr. Potato Head doll seized by Australian Customs officials was packed with 293 grams of ecstasy.
More than five tons of marijuana were packed into this furniture confiscated by British authorities in 2005.
In 2009 Spanish officials in Barcelona arrested a man arriving from Chile with a cast on his leg they determined had been made out of cocaine.
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