Coast Guard's record year for cocaine busts

SFGate

The U.S. Coast Guard seized a record-breaking amount of cocaine from drug smugglers' ships in the past year, the agency said this morning.

The Coast Guard, in cooperation with other federal law enforcement agencies, intercepted 150 tons of cocaine in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, topping the record of 120 tons set in fiscal 2003-04.

The estimated street value of the cocaine seized this year is $9.5 billion, officials said. The amount of cocaine seized could have been divided into more than 100 million hits, they said.

The majority of interdictions took place in the eastern Pacific along the coast of Central and South America, the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico and along the U.S. Atlantic coast.

During August and September, officials said, the Coast Guard working with Navy ships stopped 11 attempts to smuggle significant amounts of the drug into the United States through maritime trafficking routes in the eastern Pacific.

The three most recent incidents netted a total of 11.5 tons of cocaine.