Thursday, June 11, 2009

Massive, Elaborate Tunnel Found At Mexican Border

Via FoxNews (h/t National Terror Alert) -

We got tipped off late Wednesday evening and within a few hours we were on a plane and then on the road arriving in Nogales just as the sun peaked over the Sonoran Desert. Our contacts had told us of an elaborate tunnel, one of the best they've ever found, running 45 feet or so on the Mexican side of the border, then extending another 38 feet into the United States.

The location of the tunnel wasn't hard for us to find, even at such an early hour. On the American side two familiar green and white Customs and Border Protection vans sit about a half block down the street from a hole in the street covered by big metal slabs. Nearby I look through the 4 inch slats in the 16-foot high border fence, I see four truckload's of Mexican Federales guarding a one-story white building.

The Mexican Federal Police tell me in Spanish that the tunnel started in an abandoned white house just a few feet from where we are standing. The tunnel then stretches under the border fence about six feet under ground, headed towards a building that had recently lost its tenant on the U.S. side. It is about three feet high and wide with bricks and boards fortifying the sides and metal bars holding the roof. They tell me I could easily crawl through the tunnel with a back back (I am 6'3") and the tunnel was likely being financed and built by the Gulf Cartel, a dangerous gang of thugs who have been terrorizing much of this area.

By mid morning a construction crew has now arrived as have begun to jackhammer the street in a couple of other locations looking for another possible tunnel. CPB agents tell me they had received intelligence in recent weeks that an elaborate tunnel was being built, but it was actually a neighboring business owner who tipped them off when he heard construction sounds, but saw no work. Agents then went inside the nearby building and found two men digging the exit hole which connected to the tunnel meant to likely smuggle drugs, humans and who knows what else.

The tunnel will soon be filled with cement as agents now tell us they have already found 16 tunnels in the Nogales area since last October, that's already more than double all of last year. As I speak with U.S. agents and Federales in spanish, both concede that the powerful and brutal Gulf Cartel is likely behind the tunnels in hopes of securing a route for drugs and people into the United States.

---------------------------------

Video and images....

No comments:

Post a Comment