Customs Agents Find Drug Tunnel Under Border

DOUGLAS, Ariz. —  U.S. Customs Service agents who suspected that smugglers had developed a literal underground pipeline between Agua Prieta, Mexico, and Douglas this morning found a tunnel “like something out of a James Bond movie,” a customs spokeswoman said.

The tunnel was about the length of a football field and 30 feet underground, said Judy Turner, a customs spokeswoman in Houston.

She said it was five feet high, four feet wide, well lit, and had concrete piers for support. The “mules,” or workers, lugged cocaine over a matted floor. At the side of the tunnel at various points were compartments where up to five tons of drugs could be stashed.

One entrance was in a Douglas warehouse about 200 feet north of the border, and the other was in a house in Agua Prieta only 73 feet south of the fence that separates the border cities, Turner said.

The house in the Sonoran city featured a compressor-operated system of hydraulic jacks which raised the entire floor of the structure for entrance to the tunnel.