Spain’s First Seized Narco-Submarine Put on Display at The National Police Museum in Ávila

Spain’s First Seized Narco-Submarine Put on Display at The National Police Museum in Ávila For Public Viewing.

The first ‘narco-submarine’ seized in Europe can now be visited at the National Police Museum in Ávila located northwest of Madrid. In  November 2019, the National Police and the Civil Guard seized the first narco-submarine off European shores.

The semi-submersible, the first to be intercepted in Europe, left the port of Vigo in Spain last week where it had been in storage for 14 months. It was loaded aboard a truck and then escorted by several vehicles of the National Police Agency for the journey to the educational centre in the region of Ávila.

The transfer had passed the usual mandatory judicial authorisation and was handed over to the National Police. After required refurbishment, the boat will remain in storage at the teaching centre of the National Police in Avila where members of the public are welcome to view the interesting craft.

The narco-submarine was intercepted off the Galician coast in an anti-drug operation carried out in the Aldán estuary. The boat, which was carrying three tons of cocaine split up into 152 bundles, was manned by three drug traffickers who were detained by investigators. Subsequent investigations led to the arrest of four more people involved in the heist.

Stories about the existence in European waters of “narco-submarines such as the ones operating in the Pacific” had turned into something of a legend for Spanish narcotics officers. Since 2006, they had been hearing about drug-laden semi-submersibles making the trip to Spain and Africa. But no one had ever caught one.

An international tip-off put investigators on the trail of a submarine carrying 3,000 kilos of cocaine from Colombia to Galicia, a region with a long history of drug-smuggling activity.

The vessel was intercepted off the coast of Aldán, and within the municipal borders of Cangas do Morrazo, in Pontevedra province. Sources at the time said that the submarine was made in Guyana in South America, and had been in operation “for years.” It was able to make “at least two trips a year.” until police seized it.

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