Spanish authorities arrested five crewmembers, four Dutch and one German, after they were caught with 300 kilograms of cocaine on M/Y HCH-X near Mallorca on August 19, according to NL Times.
Officers found 150 kilograms in five packs inside the vessel and the other 150 in a double bottom floor of the captain’s cabin. The estimated value of the cocaine found on the 32-meter vessel is €18 million, according to Maritime Bulletin.
These arrests were the result of an investigation between Spanish customs and Europol, which began a year and a half ago when Spanish customs intercepted a ship with drugs, which was a part of a smuggling network, according to Het Laatste Nieuws.
Local media Diario de Mallorca reports the cocaine came from Colombia and had been thrown into the sea from a freighter. They intended to take it to Girona and transport it by car to Holland. The five crewmembers were all sent to prison by a judge on August 21.
The head of the operational customs surveillance unit, Ernesto Carvajal, says this is one of the most important cocaine seizures made in this archipelago of the Mediterranean, Prensa Latina reports.