Published July 27th, 2026 - 11:43 GMT
ALBAWABA - One boat cruising the Atlantic was found to have 2.6 tons of cocaine - leading to its interception in a joint operation by Italian and Portuguese authorities.The 2.6 tons equal a street value of almost $550 million, all in one speedboat, according to Italy’s finance police along with their Portuguese counterparts."The boat was intercepted off the coast of Lisbon by the Portuguese maritime police," said the financial police, which had conducted the investigation. They added that four people: two Spaniards, one Albanian, and one Gibraltarian were arrested. The boat was intercepted by the police on Thursday, 90 kilometers southwest of Cape Espichel, not far from the Portuguese capital of Lisbon.🇵🇹Authorities have seized more than 2.6 tonnes of cocaine in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Portugal, with an estimated street value of around €500 million.The drugs were discovered aboard an ultra-fast rigid inflatable boat, the type commonly used by smugglers to recover… pic.twitter.com/8nPcUoy5aB— NewsForce (@Newsforce) July 27, 2026 Italian police weren’t surprised, saying that organized crime gangs were routinely using "go fast" boats between 10-16 meters long which can travel at more than 70 knots, which comes to around 130 kilometers per hour, all in order to collect their illegal cargo undetected.This seizure, however, is notable for the sheer amount of cocaine transported at a single time; the 2.6 ton seizure netting drug traffickers a half a billion dollar loss in one afternoon.
