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Colombian Navy seizes unmanned ‘narco sub' equipped with Starlink antenna
Officials say that while there were no drugs on board, the vessel was designed to carry up to 1.5 tons of cocaine and travel a distance of about 1,200km
The Colombian Navy has announced the first ever seizure of an unmanned "narco sub" equipped with a Starlink antenna off the Caribbean coast.
The empty semisubmersible was not carrying drugs, but the Colombian navy and Western security sources believe it was a trial run by a cocaine trafficking cartel.
"It was being tested and was empty," a naval spokeswoman confirmed to AFP.
Officials say that while there were no drugs on board, the vessel was designed to carry up to 1.5 tons of cocaine and travel a distance of about 1,200km.
While manned semisubmersibles built in secret jungle shipyards have been used for decades to ferry cocaine from Colombia, the world's biggest cocaine producer, to Central America or Mexico, this marks the first known discovery of an autonomous narco-submarine in South American waters.
The narco-sub surrounded by navy vessels
Today's News in 90 Seconds - July 4th
The Colombian navy said the drone semisubmersible was owned by the Gulf Clan, the country's largest drug trafficking group and one of several cartels recently designated as foreign terrorist groups by the United States.
According to the US State Department, the group's "primary source of income is from cocaine trafficking, which it uses to fund its paramilitary activities'.
The submarine had two antennas including one protected with fiberglass that was connected to a Starlink satellite modem for communication.
It was also equipped with two surveillance cameras, one for navigating the vessel and the other for monitoring its engine.
Naval officials said the unmanned semi-submersible that was built in Colombia travels close to the water's surface, making it hard to detect, with only the air inlets and antenna visible above the waterline.
Admiral Juan Ricardo Rozo, Chief of the Colombian Navy, told a press conference that traffickers are moving toward more advanced and unmanned smuggling systems.
He added that the use of such technology shows a shift in drug trafficking strategies toward more innovative and adaptive methods.
However, this is not the first time a Starlink antenna has been used at sea by suspected drug traffickers.
In November, Indian police seized a giant consignment of meth worth $4.25 billion in a vessel steered remotely by Starlink near the remote Andaman and Nicobar islands.
Juana Cabezas, a researcher at Colombia's Institute for Development and Peace Studies, told AFP that powerful Mexican drug cartels, who operate in Colombia, "hired technology experts and engineers to develop an unmanned submarine" as far back as 2017.
"Removing the crew eliminates the risk of captured operators cooperating with authorities," Henry Shuldiner, an investigator for the US-based InSight Crime think tank, stated.
Shuldiner also highlighted the challenge of assembling crews to sail makeshift subs described as floating "coffins."
In 2023, a "narco sub" with two dead bodies and nearly three tons of cocaine aboard was seized off the coast of Colombia.
A near record number of the low-profile vessels were intercepted in the Atlantic and Pacific in 2024, according to the report.
Other unmanned vessels have also been detected in the Mediterranean, often used for short coastal trips between countries like Albania, Italy, Morocco, and Spain.
In another case in November 2024, a semi-submersible loaded with five tons of Colombian cocaine was seized en route to Australia.
Colombian law punishes the use, construction, marketing, possession and transportation of semisubmersibles with penalties of up to 14 years in prison.
Though commonly spotted off the coast of Colombia, narco subs have been intercepted across the globe in recent months.
Just last week, the Mexican navy seized 3.5 tons of cocaine hidden in a semisubmersible vessel off the Pacific coast, while releasing video of the "narco sub" being intercepted.
In March, Portuguese police said forces had confiscated nearly 6.5 tons of cocaine from a semisubmersible vessel off the remote Azores archipelago that was bound for the Iberian peninsula. In January, a suspected narco sub broke in two pieces as a fishing boat was towing it to a port in northwest Spain.
According to the UN drug agency, cocaine production, seizures, and use all hit record highs in 2023. Colombia, the world's largest cocaine producer, has seen a sharp rise in production due to increased global demand.
Colombian law punishes the use, construction, marketing, possession, and transport of semi-submersibles with sentences of up to 14 years in prison.
