Largest fentanyl bust in Border Patrol history: Trump praises agents after they seize 254 pounds of the opioid – enough to kill more than 100million people – being driven into Arizona from Mexico
US Customs and Border Patrol agents have seized a record amount of fentanyl at the Nogales border crossing between Arizona and Mexico
A total of 254 pounds of the deadly opioid was found on Saturday inside a trailer
That’s enough to kill more than 100 million people, and possibly four times that
The street value of the mostly powder-form drug is said to be $3.5million
They also seized 395 pounds of methamphetamine with a street value of $1.18m
The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a recent report that fentanyl is now the drug most often involved in fatal overdoses within the US
Fentanyl has caused more than 18,000 of the 63,000 overdose fatalities in 2016
By STEPHANIE HANEY
DAILYMAIL.COM
31 January 2019
Donald Trump has congratulated U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials after they made their biggest ever fentanyl bust, seizing a quantity large enough to kill 100million people.
CBP officials said they captured nearly 254 pounds (114kg) of the deadly synthetic opioid from a secret compartment inside a truck carrying a load of Mexican produce heading into US at the Nogales border crossing in Arizona.
The drugs, with a street value of about $3.5million, were found on Saturday morning, hidden in a compartment under the rear floor of a tractor-trailer.
The president tweeted his praise for the officials on Thursday, writing; ‘Our great US Border Patrol Agents made the biggest Fentanyl bust in our Country’s history. thanks, as always, for a job well done!’
Agents also seized nearly 395 pounds (179kg) of methamphetamine with a street value of $1.18million, Nogales CBP Port Director Michael Humphries said.
After a scan during secondary inspection indicated ‘some anomalies’ in the load, the agency’s police dog team alerted officers to the presence of drugs, Humphries said.
‘It is said that a quarter-milligram, or the size of a few grains of salt, of fentanyl, which is a dangerous opioid, can kill a person very quickly,’ Humphries said.
The seizure, he said, had prevented an immense number of doses of the drug ‘that could have harmed so many families.’
By his measure of a fatal dose, the seizure could have prevented 460,849,472 overdoses, to be exact, based on there being 453,592 milligrams in a single pound.
Mexican traffickers have been increasingly smuggling the drug into the United States, mostly hidden in passenger vehicles and tractor-trailers trying to head through ports of entry in the Nogales, Arizona, and San Diego areas.
Fentanyl has caused a surge in fatal overdoses around the US, including the 2016 accidental death of pop music legend Prince.
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