CBP Officers Discover Cocaine on Commercial Flight

Editor's note: the following comes from a press release from the Department of Homeland Security. It has not been edited.

After a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) narcotics detector dog alerted, officers discovered a little more than 18 pounds of cocaine concealed in the cargo hold of a commercial airplane that arrived Wednesday at Washington Dulles International Airport.

CBP K9 Rex alerted during a routine inspection of an Avianca Airlines flight from Bogota, Colombia. Officers then discovered seven taped packages behind a cargo hold panel. The packages, which field-tested positive for cocaine, weighed approximately 8.265 kilograms, or 18 pounds, 3.5 ounces. The cocaine has a street value of about $580,000.

Federal authorities continue investigating.

“Nefarious narcotics organizations continue to leverage all means to smuggle their deadly poison to the United States, even placing narcotics aboard unsuspecting commercial aircraft,” said Christopher Hess, CBP Port Director for the Port of Washington, D.C. “Customs and Border Protection officers remain committed to intercepting these smuggling attempts through the use of detector dogs and routine compliance inspections on international aircraft, particularly those arriving from narcotics source nations.”

In addition to narcotics interdiction, CBP routinely conducts random inspection operations on arriving and departing international flights and intercepts currency, weapons, prohibited agriculture products or other illicit items.