Customs Surveillance Operation of the Tax Agency

• The narcotic substance was transported by a semi-rigid inflatable boat twelve metres long with two 300 HP engines each.
• One of those in charge of transferring the drugs from the boat to a van has been arrested

October 18, 2022.- Customs Surveillance Officers of the Tax Agency have seized 180 kilos of hashish that had been unloaded from a semi-rigid boat on the beach of Balanegra (Almería) and have arrested one person.

The operation began on October 12 at around 00:30, when the Alca Customs Surveillance patrol boat, based in Almería, detected the presence of a semi-rigid vessel sailing north towards the Punta del Río de Adra area.

The vessel was immediately followed by sea, with support from the forces deployed on land.

At around 2:00 a.m., the boat landed on Balanegra beach, where there were about ten people, who began to transfer the bales from the boat to a van.

At that time, Customs Surveillance officials, both by sea and by land, intervened, proceeding to seize five bales of hashish, the arrest of one of the participants in the stash, with the initials NLS, as well as the seizure of various radio communication devices and 900 liters of fuel.

It was found that the boat used in the stash was a semi-rigid inflatable boat twelve metres long with two 300 HP engines each, of the type normally used for trafficking hashish from Morocco to the Spanish coast.

The boat with the detainee, the narcotic substance and the seized gasoline was then transferred to the port of Almería, where it was temporarily stored. The competent judicial authority is the Court of Instruction number two of Berja (Almería) acting as on-call court.

Investigations are still underway by the Customs Surveillance Operational Unit in Almería, in order to determine the identity of the rest of the people involved in the stash.