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Associated Press

US authorities say they have discovered the longest smuggling tunnel running between Mexico and California.
The tunnel, discovered Wednesday, stretches 1.3km from an industrial site in Tijuana, Mexico, to the San Diego area.
The tunnel featured an extensive rail cart system, forced air ventilation, high voltage electrical cables and panels, an lift at the tunnel entrance and a drainage system.

While there were no arrests, no drugs found at the site and no confirmed exit point in the US, the length – more than 14 football fields – stunned authorities.
“This one blows past (the second-longest),” said Lance LeNoir, a Border Patrol operations supervisor. “We never really thought they had the moxie to go that far. They continue to surprise me.”
Border officers discover tunnel used to smuggle Chinese from Mexico into US
The tunnel exposes limitations of US President Donald Trump’s border wall, which stretches several feet underground in the area and is considered effective against small, crudely built tunnels often called “gopher holes”. The one announced Wednesday was found about 21 metres underground, well below the wall.

Following the discovery in August, Mexican law enforcement identified the entrance and US investigators mapped the tunnel that extends a total of 1,313 metres. The next longest tunnel in the US was discovered in San Diego in 2014. It was 904 metres long.
The newly discovered tunnel is about 1.7 metres tall and 60cm wide.
Agents discovered several hundred sandbags blocking a suspected former exit of the tunnel in San Diego’s Otay Mesa industrial warehouse area. It went under several warehouses in Otay Mesa, where sophisticated tunnels have typically ended, and extended into open fields.
Smugglers cut holes in Trump’s US$10 billion wall with US$100 tools. Trump says that’s ‘easily fixed’
US authorities say they are confident that the tunnel exited in San Diego at one time, based on its trajectory.
LeNoir, a veteran on the multi-agency task force of tunnel investigators known as “tunnel rats”, said he made his way through about 15 metres of sugar sacks blocking the tunnel but couldn’t go any farther.
An incomplete offshoot of the tunnel that extended 1,090 metres suggested to authorities that smugglers had plugged an initial exit point and were building another.
The suspected previous exit “became unsustainable for whatever reason, so they built a spur”, Border Patrol spokesman Jeff Stephenson said.

With a total length of 4,309 feet, authorities say they have discovered "the longest illicit cross-border tunnel" from Mexico to San Diego. https://t.co/012nhYU1Cv pic.twitter.com/d8rtBzX3nv
— ABC News (@ABC) January 30, 2020

By federal law, US authorities must fill the US side of tunnels with concrete after they are discovered.
“The sophistication and length of this particular tunnel demonstrates the time-consuming efforts transnational criminal organisations will undertake to facilitate cross-border smuggling,” said Cardell Morant, acting special agent in charge of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations unit in San Diego.
Accused people smuggler Neil Edwin Valera charged in deaths of three Chinese migrants found in boot of his BMW in San Diego
Authorities have found 15 sophisticated tunnels on California’s border with Mexico since 2006, with hallmarks including lighting, ventilation, railway tracks and hydraulic lifts.
The tunnels are concentrated in Otay Mesa, an area where claylike soil is conducive to digging and warehouses provide cover.
The latest tunnel was discovered by Mexican authorities in a Tijuana car park for cargo trucks, next to the city’s airport.
US authorities mapped its course, drilled a hole on the US side and lowered a camera to determine where to start making their way through.
“It was endless,” LeNoir said.
Authorities didn’t say who they believe was behind the tunnel but the area has been a stronghold of Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel. The cartel’s long-time leader, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, was sentenced to life in US prison in July.
Additional reporting by DPA


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Mexico

US authorities discover longest smuggling tunnel from Mexico: it’s 1.3km and sits 21 metres below ground

The tunnel is about 1.7 metres high, 60 centimetres wide and about 21 metres deep. Photo: Reuters

Standing next to a bore hole, drilled by officials to help map the tunnel, Deputy Chief Patrol Agent Aaron Heitke, right, and Special Operations Supervisor Cesar Sotelo, left, answer questions during a news conference near the Otay Mesa Port of Entry in San Diego. (Nelvin C. Cepeda/San Diego Union-Tribune/TNS)

The "Baja Metro Tunnel", which U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) says is the longest illicit cross-border tunnel ever discovered along the Southwest border, is seen under Otay Mesa, California, U.S. October 30, 2019. Picture taken October 30, 2019. U.S. Customs and Border Protection/Handout via REUTERS. THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY.

Border officers discover tunnel used to smuggle Chinese from Mexico into US

Mexican police stand guard at a warehouse where the entrance of a tunnel used to smuggle Chinese nationals into the US was found in Tijuana on Sunday. Photo: AFP

A Border Patrol vehicle is seen through the border fence near the exit of a tunnel used to smuggle people found at the US-Mexico border on August 27, 2017 in Tijuana, northwestern Mexico. Military authorities have uncovered a tunnel under the Mexico-US border that was used to smuggle migrants from the city of Tijuana to San Diego, California, the Mexican government said Sunday. / AFP PHOTO / GUILLERMO ARIAS

Police lines surround the warehouse where the entrance of a tunnel used to smuggle people was found at the US-Mexico border on August 27, 2017 in Tijuana, northwestern Mexico. Military authorities have uncovered a tunnel under the Mexico-US border that was used to smuggle migrants from the city of Tijuana to San Diego, California, the Mexican government said Sunday. / AFP PHOTO / GUILLERMO ARIAS

Smugglers cut holes in Trump’s US$10 billion wall with US$100 tools. Trump says that’s ‘easily fixed’

US President Donald Trump has made building a wall to stem the flow of migrants crossing into the United States from Mexico a key plank of his presidency. File photo: AFP

Work continues on the new 30-foot-high, bollard wall along the U.S.-Mexico border on the Colorado River near County 11th Street, Friday, Nov. 1, 2019. When the project is complete, the new wall will stretch for five miles along the border.(Randy Hoeft/The Yuma Sun via AP)

Aerial view of US President Donald Trump's border wall prototypes as seen from Tijuana, in Baja California state, Mexico, on January 7, 2019. - US President Donald Trump stood firm Sunday on his demand for billions of dollars to fund a border wall with Mexico, claiming "tremendous" support inside his camp on the contentious issue which has forced a government shutdown now entering its third week. (Photo by Guillermo Arias / AFP)

A portion of the wall on the US-Mexico border is seen from Chihuahua State in Mexico. Photo: AFP

Accused people smuggler Neil Edwin Valera charged in deaths of three Chinese migrants found in boot of his BMW in San Diego

Video recordings show Neil Edwin Valera driving into the United States at San Diego’s San Ysidro border. Photo: Handout

Aerial view of cars waiting to cross the San Ysidro Port of Entry bording crossing that connects the US-Mexico border cities of San Diejo and Tijuana seen from Tijuana, in Baja California state, Mexico, on March 29, 2019. - President Donald Trump on Friday again accused Mexico of failing to curb the flow of migrants illegally entering the US, and threatened to close the common border "next week" unless something changes. Trump's latest tweets ramp up the tension between the neighbors, putting a specific timeframe to his threats to shut the border, one of the busiest in the world. (Photo by Guillermo Arias / AFP)

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World

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The tunnel was about 21 metres deep and came equipped with lift, rail cart system, ventilation, and drainage system
Tunnels are just one method of moving drugs or people into the US



It was the longest smuggling tunnel ever found on the Southwest border, stretching from an industrial site in Tijuana, Mexico, to the San Diego area.


United States

US immigration

Drugs

US authorities discover longest smuggling tunnel from Mexico: it’s 1.3km and sits 21 metres below ground

The tunnel was about 21 metres deep and came equipped with lift, rail cart system, ventilation, and drainage system Tunnels are just one method of moving drugs or people into the US

The tunnel was about 21 metres deep and came equipped with lift, rail cart system, ventilation, and drainage system

Tunnels are just one method of moving drugs or people into the US