In recent news, Spanish authorities caught a huge drone that was being used as a transportation vehicle to carry drugs. Of course, drug dealers are getting smarter with their transactions and making full use of technology to deliver “the goods”.
Unidad de Droga Y Crimen Organizado or UDYCO is a specialized crime unit of the National Police Force of Spain that was on the trail of a French drug trafficking group in the area when they came across the 15 feet wide drone and to their surprise, it was loaded with drugs! The drone was found in a narcotics storage house outside Almachar, along with 30kg of marijuana and 55kg of hashish. It appears that this wasn’t the first time the UDYCO came across a unique drug smuggling transportation device. Last year, they caught a 30-foot long semi-submersible vessel that was used to smuggle drugs. Talk about being creative…
Coming to the drone specs, it’s a Chinese-built drone with four electric motors which are used for taking off and landing along with a fifth motor which is used as the combustion engine for horizontal flight. The drone has a speed capacity of about 170km/hr and can fly at an altitude of 7000 feet; that’s 7 hours of flight for quick drug delivery from Almachar all the way to Morocco. The drone was operated using an electronic system, going back and forth between the origin and destination and stopping along the way.
It seems like the drug smuggling gang wasn’t aware of the high technology of the drone and that it could be flown remotely as well. Who knows, maybe if they were a bit more tech savvy, they could have gotten away with it too.