60% of international packages received by the U.S. Postal Service
arrive here, at New York's JFK.
The busiest mail port in the country.
A million packages per day come through this facility.
At this time of year that ususally means Christmas gifts and care packages
but these customs officers are hunting for something else.
Frank Russo is the port director for U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
His team of one hundred officers is on the lookout for illegal drugs.
Especially Fentanyl:
A highly dangerous synthetic opioid that's now flowing into the country at a record rate.
So you see there they're protected, they have their gloves on, they have a mask on
and they're gonna open up a package. Let's see what they find.
CBP didn't start tracking how much Fentanyl it intercepted until October 2015.
But over the next year, it found 459 pounds.
In 2017, it found 1,296 pounds.
They'll try anything.
We see the Fentanyl coming in toys, we see it coming in food products
You name it and they'll try to use it.
And what technology are you using to screen for the Fentanyl?
We use spectrometry.
We can shoot a laser at a package without having to open up the package.
That's critically important for our officers to make sure that they're safe.
We've introduced K9 training to detect Fentanyl.
Just in the last few months they've made over ten Fentanyl seizures.
This year, Frank Russo's team made 84 Fentanyl Seizures,
up from just seven last year.
When the officers determine they have a package that contains Fentanyl, it's set aside for testing.
They have to be very careful.
Inhaling just two miligrams, the equivalent of a few grains of salt,
can be deadly.
It really comes down to training,