Drug-laden phantom vessels are approaching the Australian coastline, raising concerns about the nation’s readiness to tackle such threats, cautions an expert.
In recent months, there have been at least three instances of unmanned ‘narco subs’—partially or fully submersible crafts used by cartels to transport massive drug shipments across oceans—spotted near Australian waters.
One of these crafts, measuring approximately 25 meters, was initially observed drifting near Ramos Island on July 28 by a local politician.
Another was discovered in early August, floating in the clear waters near the Solomon Islands, specifically at a coral atoll located roughly 400 kilometers north of Isabel Island.
The third vessel, a 17-meter-long craft, was identified earlier this month in Malaita province and captured in photos by the local enterprise, Graceland Architects.
A social media post highlighted, “Another find was brought ashore at our village beachfront in Fourau, Northeast Malaita.”
‘The narco subs are merging into the Pacific Ocean and into our Islands. Not a good sight for our younger generation.’
It is understood the submersibles, which usually ferry cocaine along the coasts of South and Central America towards the United States, could have been using a route via the Solomon Islands to reach Australia, which lies less than 2,000km away.
Since August, there have been at least three sightings of unmanned ‘narco subs’ in the Solomon Islands, which lie less than 2,000km away from Australia
‘These are low-profile, hard-to-find, hard-to-stop vessels,’ Strategic Analysis Australia founder Michael Shoebridge told news.com.au on Tuesday.
‘They can go about 10 knots, so it can take about a month to go from South America to Australia – and you can carry tonnes of drugs in them.
He argued Australia’s border and defence force should work with Pacific partners to ‘disrupt and arrest drug smugglers’.
‘The problem of very profitable drug routes coming from South America to Australia via the South Pacific is something that should be a higher priority than it is, and our navy is not well-equipped to surveil and disrupt these narco subs,’ he said.
This was echoed by Jose Sousa-Santos, head of the Pacific Regional Security Hub at Canterbury University, who said the boats are proof cartels are active in the region.
‘(Those discoveries) definitely show a new trend being used by trans-criminal syndicates in South America and Mexico, to traffic drugs to Australia and New Zealand, the “cash cows” in the region,’ he told RNZ.
‘There are choke points – we see movement between Tonga and French Polynesia, Samoa and the wider Pacific, Fiji and the Solomon Islands, PNG and Australia, which we need to patrol more effectively.’
The issue is not entirely surprising, with a similar craft appearing north of Isabel Island in August last year, the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project reported.
The ghost ships are semi or fully-submersible vessels which drug cartels use to send large amounts of their illicit products across oceans
Some of the ‘narco ships’ drifting through the Pacific may be heading for Australia, experts say
Physician-turned-businessman Dr Reginald Aipa found the abandoned boat, which was missing starter motors, steering connections, and a battery.
An Ecuadorian voter ID card was found on board, suggesting a possible link to South America.
Pacific Community Centre for Ocean Science head Jerome Aucan said long, low vessels ‘can absolutely cross oceans’.
‘There is definitely a pathway for an object to drift from the coast of South America all the way to Malaita,’ he said.
‘But it might just as easily have crossed under its own power … (The fuel tank) could contain thousands and thousands of litres of fuel.’
He warned that, if abandoned near Fiji or Vanuatu, currents could have pulled the submersibles toward Australia before looping it north into the Solomon Islands.
While the issue appears to be more uncharted territory for Australian authorities, it has dominated headlines in the United States.
The US military has been combating ‘narco-terrorists’ who use boats to carry drugs from the Pacific to American shores (pictured, a narco-sub at Ghoveo village in Isabel Province)
Earlier this week, Donald Trump ordered three strikes against four boats accused of carrying drugs in the Pacific ocean, killing 14 ‘narco-terrorists’.
The announcement was made by Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, who noted one ‘narco-terrorist’ survivor was captured by Mexican search and rescue.
Hegseth said Mexico ‘assumed responsibility for coordinating the rescue’ but did not clarify if the survivor would be handed over to the US.
Footage of the strikes on the drug boats was posted to social media, where one vessel visibly filled with large numbers of parcels suddenly explodes while moving in the water.
Other footage shows two stationary drug boats with at least two people seen moving along them before a US bomb engulfs the vessels in flame.
The total number of strikes on drug boats since early September 13 has risen to 13, with approximately 57 ‘narco-terrorists’ killed.
