BELIZE CITY, Tues. Mar. 8, 2022– As Thursday night, March 3, was ending, a Gulfstream G2 luxury jet believed to be carrying a sizeable payload of South American cocaine, landed on a boggy land mass in the midst of a lagoon off the Southern Highway. The Joint Intelligence Operation Center (JIOC) was notified that the aircraft was en route to Belize around 9:00 o’clock that night, but a small group of officers on the ground who were heading to the landing site were again outmaneuvered and were thwarted in their efforts to reach the site by spikes that had been placed in the surrounding area. They were thus unable to reach the location of the landing in time to disrupt the off-loading and transportation of the plane’s cargo, which could have been as much as a tonne of cocaine, given the carrying capacity of the jet. That cargo was then transported by ATV’s and loaded onto boats which presumably took the drugs into Mexican waters.
By now, the cargo, likely cocaine from South America, has been transported into Mexican territory, and the high-end aircraft remains bogged in the soft, muddy area just a short distance from Monkey River Village in Southern Belize.
“Sometime after 9:00 p.m. last night, a track was declared leaving South America and heading our way. The information was relayed through J.I.O.C., and based on that, J.I.O.C. contacted our operations commander for us to relinquish operation of the, or control of the operation teams, that is the Q.R.T. or the A.N.U. and some elements of the M.I.T. and Special Patrol Unit to them for deployment in the respective areas that we would normally deploy. As you would know, that in order to maximize on our resources, we would normally have police, B.D.F., and Coast Guard deployed. And so that was done from around 9:30 p.m. last night, and we continued to monitor the track until it entered our airspace, which was sometime after 1:00 a.m. last night, and it passed our airspace and went into Mexico‘s airspace,” Commissioner of Police, Chester Williams told reporters during a Zoom briefing on Friday following police’s initial investigation.
He said that the jet then made an abrupt turn and re-entered Belize’s airspace, where it headed to the remote area off the Southern Highway, where it landed.
“It stayed over Mexico for a few minutes, and then it made a turn and came back into our airspace.” ComPol Williams said, adding, “The plane then came and went south and made landing on a small little island-type area in the Monkey River area.”
A four-man team of police officers was stationed about 10 miles from the landing location and proceeded to make their way to the area, but according to ComPol Williams, were thwarted by spikes left on the road by the narcos – similar to what took place when a drug plane landed near Carmelita Village on February 21.
“We had a team which was based about ten miles away from where the plane landed, but that was just a four-man team. Notwithstanding that, the team attempted to go to the area where the plane landed, but again, they were met by spikes on the road and that disabled the vehicle from proceeding to the particular area,” Williams said.
According to Williams, the area in which the plane landed is very difficult to access, since it is an island-type land mass that is surrounded by a deep lagoon. The delay caused by the difficulties police encountered in traversing the terrain that leads to the area, coupled with the need to lean on Coast Guard vessels to reach the area by boat, prevented officers from reaching the off-loading area and making any attempt to avert the operation. (It has been reported by 7News that at some point some officers had used a boat belonging to a nearby shrimp farm, whose workers had heard the landing of the plane, to attempt to get to the site.)
“Now, remember, I said that this area is surrounded by water, and so, the road that had the spike would have only taken the team probably about a mile or so from where the plane had landed, and then when they got to that location, there is a lagoon that they would have had to cross, a very deep lagoon. And so by foot, the team was not able to get to the location. They had to use boats. With the assistance of the Coast Guard, they were able to get on that area where the plane had landed,” Commissioner Williams explained.
He said that the Mexican air asset had an aerial view of the operation that was taking place on the ground while our local authorities were trying to reach the location.
“We had aerial assistance from Mexican air assets, and they had indicated to us, play by play what was happening, and they said that there was like several ATV’s, and there were three boats right by the lagoon, and the cargo was loaded from the plane and the ATV’s were used and taken to the boat and then the boats took the drugs through the sea and perhaps went over to the Mexican side through the sea,” Williams said.
As mentioned, by the time police reached the landing site, there were no drugs or narco operatives in sight, so no arrests were made. What remained on the scene, other than the Gulfstream jet, was a sunken ATV and a wooden trailer. This is the third drug plane to land in the country in just two weeks, with this Gulfstream G2 jet being valued at upwards of $10 million BZD.