and now to a one and only exclusive
local 10 heading to the u.s mexico
border as the fentanyl crisis grow
continues to grow the situation so dire
that the dea declared today the first
ever national fentanyl awareness day as
local 10 saw first-hand vehicles get
searched by agents sniffed out by dogs
and even x-rays and those are not the
only ways law enforcement is keeping
millions of pounds of drugs off the
streets right here in the u.s and
sometimes they have to see what's lying
beneath local 10 shooting stanwood
brings us part two of our investigation
[Music]
we're going where the smugglers go
let's go underground
come on through watch your head this is
the grand tunnel a massive storm and
drainage channel that moves water
beneath the u.s mexico border in arizona
it has also moved people and drugs the
reflective line you see right there that
is the international boundary
this is the underground route from
mexico to the united states via this
drainage tunnel agents say it looks a
lot different now than it did 20 years
ago over the last 20 years we've been
able to take back control of this
drainage system
126 smuggling tunnels have been
discovered by highly specialized u.s
border patrol agents with a tucson
sector near the border town nogales some
like this uncovered inside a house in a
retirement community that spot right
there where we are smugglers have not
only tapped into this infrastructure but
they hand dig other illicit passageways
like this one we were able to figure out
that the tunnel existed and then part of
our process is we need to fill it back
up so they can't use it again
this giant gate has stopped smugglers
from using the main thoroughfare and
thanks to a partnership with law
enforcement in mexico and technology
like cameras 34 more tunnels have been
uncovered in this channel alone since
2009 we're never going to stop them
obviously from trying to smuggle
narcotics and people but our presence
here makes it more difficult for them
just a few miles west and above the
surface is the u.s customs and border
protection nogales port of entry it's a
mixed load where trucks full of food and
goods get inspected every day
it's also where massive amounts of drugs
have been stopped officers seeing a
spike in the synthetic opioid fentanyl
how many fentanyl pills so far have you
seized right so we're about three
million for this fiscal year here in
nogales three million pills six thousand
pounds of methamphetamine this is a city
of 20 000 people it's not staying here
it's it's going to the west coast the
east coast port director michael
humphries who happened to have busted
the little brother of drug kingpin el
chapo back in 1989 tells us smugglers
get creative
recently hiding fentanyl in crock pots
full of meat just gonna take this piece
of art home
taping it to religious artwork and
stuffing it in car parts so this is a
car battery they hollow it out they
insert a lawnmower or motorcycle battery
they have a void there and they'll fill
it with fentanyl pills so what we do
here at the border prevents
all of that from making it to south
florida and ohio to kentucky and new
york
preventing tragedies like what happened
last fall to melissa hernandez a 21 year
old hollywood woman whose father says
took what she thought was xanax that was
actually pressed with fentanyl she was
found dead the next day
[Music]
so officers here use mirrors density
meters drug sniffing canines and x-rays
if they need to give cargo or passengers
a second look so right now this truck
this is a mobile x-ray you can see that
it is running past all of these big rigs
it's taking several photos as it goes
there's also a new state of the art
lower radiation x-ray being built so
truckers can stay in their cabs while
they're being scanned this is going to
be much more efficient and it's going to
allow us to scan
a lot more traffic than we do now it's
not just border security it's national
security we want to put a stop to this
we're fathers we're mothers we're
you know we we have nieces and nephews
we don't want them getting a hold of any
of that stuff
in nogales arizona janine stanwood local
10 news
and for more information and resources
on fentanyl or to see the first part of
our story in this series you can always
go to our website local10.com