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Britain Seizes Cocaine Worth US$46m
British Customs officers seized 500 kilograms (1,102 lb) of cocaine dumped out of a cargo plane in southern England, for their biggest haul of the drug ever, a Customs spokesman said on Wednesday.
Customs officers waiting at Southend Airport in Essex, southern England, swooped on the plane and its abandoned cargo on Tuesday night, seizing the drugs and arresting six people.
The haul was worth 32 million British pounds (US$46.3 million), he said.
"As the plane landed, the cargo door opened and six huge suitcases were pushed out the back onto the end of the taxi way," he said.
"Officers moved in immediately. They recovered the cocaine and arrested six people. It has since been confirmed that this is Britain's largest ever seizure of cocaine."
The spokesman would not say if Customs were acting on a tip-off or release any other operational details other than to say the aircraft had come from the Caribbean via the Canary Islands. He said the suitcases were so big that it took three officers to lift each one.
Five crew members and one other person, believed to be an airport worker, were arrested. There were no details available on their nationality.
They were taken to a London police station for questioning in the morning, he said.
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