- The divers in Key Largo initially thought they had stumbled upon trash
Scuba divers in Florida found a lot more than they bargained for when they stumbled across some suspicious-looking packages in the Atlantic Ocean.
On Wednesday, the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office shared the shocking discovery and revealed that the bundles are suspected to contain cocaine.
The divers in Key Largo were in the process of removing litter from the water and had initially thought they found a bag of rubbish when the identical packages caught their eye.
Authorities confirmed there were 25 individually wrapped parcels, which were found in approximately 100 feet of water in the Atlantic Ocean.
The Sheriffs responded to the Rainbow Reef Dive Center at approximately 12:25pm and turned over the suspected narcotics to the U.S. Border Patrol.
On Wednesday, the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office shared the shocking discovery, and revealed that the bundles are suspected to contain cocaine
An image shared by the MCSO on Facebook showed a ripped black rubbish bag and the 25 parcels that were reportedly inside.
Each parcel was wrapped in tight plastic and had blue text that read ‘Nike SB’ on the front, alongside a fake version of the brand’s swoosh logo.
Bundles of narcotics have often washed up on Florida beaches.
This most recent discovery comes just one month after nearly $1 million worth of cocaine washed up along the Florida Keyes and was found by a beachgoer, CBS reported. The package contained 65 pounds of cocaine.
Meanwhile, back in January, the crew of the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Margaret Norvell seized $32.2 million dollars worth of cocaine, which weighed over a ton, according to ABC News.
Coast Guard crews interdicted the illegal drugs in international waters of the Caribbean Sea during two separate cases.
Along with the illicit narcotics, six suspected smugglers were apprehended and will face prosecution in federal courts by the Department of Justice.
In July 2023, marine biologists warned that drug-addled sharks may be feasting on cocaine bales dumped by drug smugglers off the coast of Florida.
In a documentary for Discovery’s Shark Week, marine expert Tom Hird looked into whether sharks in the area could have been affected by narcotics which are often hurled into the water by drug smugglers to avoid detection.
Hird and his team of researchers noticed strange behavior and movement among the sharks and even found that when they dropped a look-alike cocaine package into the water, predators rushed toward and took bites out of it.
