Three burly men confined in a tiny space of just 1.5m². Closed there for 27 long days. Sailing underwater, breathing cold, damp air at all times. With no room to move, they took turns sleeping on bales in the hold of the submersible they were traveling on.
The bathyscaphe (a type of submarine usually used to explore great depths) that the trio were in had no evacuation system, which made them use a bag as a toilet. They fed on canned food, processed candy, energy bars and cans of Red Bull to stay awake. The three also faced wounds on their skin, caused by the wet and greasy clothes they wore all the time. There were only six narrow windows.
These three men crossed the Atlantic Ocean between October and November 2019, covering more than 3,500 nautical miles (almost 6,500 km) between Brazil and Europe aboard this small and precarious handmade submarine made of fiberglass, without large electronic devices for navigation. The vessel was equipped only with conventional satellite phones, a dashboard-mounted compass, and a compass.
On this submersible they withstood terrible storms, terrifying waves, havoc of all kinds and were on the verge of being hit by a boat on one occasion. Several times they thought they were going to die.
The objective was to take a load of 3,068 kilos of cocaine to Europe (valued at at least R$760 million, according to the European quotation) in that submersible and charge for its transport services. And they were about to get it. For several days they managed to deceive the police and intelligence services specialized in drug trafficking in several countries. But in the end they were defeated.
A police operation called “Black Tide”, which went down in history for having seized the first “narco-submarine” to arrive in Europe from Latin America, interrupted their plans and ended with the arrest of these three men.
Now they have just been tried in Spain. The three pleaded guilty, but none wanted to collaborate with the Justice for fear of retaliation against them or their families by the drug traffickers who sent the drug to Europe. The sentences are due out soon, and each of them could be sentenced to up to 13 years in prison.
The narco-submarine tradition
“Operação Maré Negra”, a book written by Galician journalist Javier Romero and published by Ediciones B, rescued in detail the incredible journey of those men who transported more than 3 tons of cocaine for 27 days.
With no scheduled release in Brazil, the work gathers testimonies from police officers, judges, experts and witnesses of the event to trace in detail the chronicle of “Che”, as the submersible was named. A submersible designed to be able to sail with most of the hull submerged, moving close to the surface, almost invisible between waves.
This is obviously not the first device of its kind. The narco-submarine tradition began in Colombia in the 1990s, at the hands of former soldiers and engineers from the former Soviet Union. The precursor was Pablo Escobar, a Colombian drug lord who never hid the fact that there were two of these submarines in his maritime fleet.
“Now they are quite common: every year between 30 and 40 are intercepted in Colombia,” Romero tells BBC News Mundo (the BBC’s Spanish service). “And although several reports by police specialists in drug trafficking have long pointed out that drug traffickers were using submarines to cross the Atlantic, none had been apprehended, until Che.”
It was built in a clandestine shipyard in the Amazon. The mission to pilot it fell to a former Spanish boxing champion and experienced sailor named Agustín Álvarez. The rest of the crew consisted of two Ecuadorian cousins, also sailors: Luis Tomás Benítez Manzaba and Pedro Roberto Delgado Manzaba.
“The price agreed by the Manzabas was US$5,000 [cerca de R$ 27 mil] advance for each, and if all went well and the mission ended successfully, an additional $50,000 per head [cerca de R$ 270 mil]. It is not known how much they would pay Agustín Álvarez, but police sources estimate that between US$400,000 and US$500,000 [entre R$ 2,1 milhões e R$ 2,7 milhões]”, points out the author of “Operation Black Tide”.
The Spanish Ministry of the Interior, in turn, estimates that the price of cocaine transported by the narco-submarine would be 123 million euros (about R$760 million) in Europe.
to underwater saga
Once loaded with 3,068 kilograms of cocaine from Colombia, distributed in 152 bales, on the night of October 29, 2019, the three crew members released the restraints and “Che” began his journey.
They first navigated the Amazon River for 12 hours, crossing high humidity, mosquitoes, mangroves and lush vegetation. It is not ruled out that some ship led them, opening the way for the narcos-submarine, preventing it from colliding with one of the thousands of trunks of all thicknesses that float on the surface of the Amazon to the Atlantic Ocean.
Despite the “Che” having no radar, automatic identification system, radio beacon or anything like that, everything was going very well. Until November 5, 2019, the eighth day of the crossing, when the first clouds appeared. “The good weather is gone, never to return, leaving the crew helpless towards their destination. The next time they saw the sun shine, against a blue sky, it was while walking in the courtyard of the Galician prison known as A Lama”, reports Romero.
From the 7th of November until the time when the submarine would reach the agreed point, three strong storms appeared on the way, one after the other, against a “Che” that was in clear deterioration. They arrived on the verge of sinking, causing their three crew to live a real nightmare for eight long days. On the 14th of November the weather gave them some respite.
There was another “detail”. At least the three crew members of the “Che” had not been locked in the narco-submarine, as was the case with submersibles that crossed the Atlantic loaded with drugs. “They locked the hatch from the outside with padlocks or something, so it wouldn’t open until they reached their destination. They gave the crew no choice but to finish the voyage to survive. It was either that or death. this because of the mistrust that existed in the past with members in Galicia [região da Espanha] in case they tried to steal goods,” one of the “Che” crew told Spanish authorities.
Seventeen days after setting sail, and after crossing the waters of the Atlantic for 4,931 kilometers, “Che” was finally able to overcome the main objective of the trip: the islands of the Azores, which belong to Portugal.
From there, the three crew members headed north to reach the past coordinates where the drug would be unloaded: 38º 14’47.4″; 14º52’01.1″. The “Che” managed to reach that precise point, 270 miles in a straight line from Lisbon, but without the expected success. The vessel was afloat and the crew was alive, but by this time the humidity and poor diet had already taken a toll on the crew’s health.
When they arrived at the area marked on the map, at the agreed place to unload the cocaine, no one came out to meet them at “Che”. Somewhere along the coast of Portugal, there were two speedboats (gliders designed and equipped exclusively to transport large quantities in the shortest possible time) ready to pick up the drug. But one of them suffered a mechanical problem and was unable to set sail.
The drug trafficking organization, according to information gathered by the Spanish police, instructed the crew of the “Che” to follow the path towards Galicia, where the pilot Agustín is from. “In Galicia there is an important business of ‘narcolancheros’ who are dedicated to the landing of drugs”, says Romero.
But realizing that the initial plan of drug trafficking professionals had failed, Agustín decided to adopt a plan B and turned to two childhood friends.
At that time, the Center for Analysis and Maritime Operations of Narcotics Trafficking (MAOC-N) was already aware that there was a vessel with several tons of cocaine in the region. Air and sea vehicles were sent in search of him, without success. They were looking for a fishing boat, a sailboat, a freighter… but not a semi-submersible.
According to the official Spanish investigation, “a Portuguese Navy patrol and air assets were at the coordinates in real time and were unable to detect (the ‘Che’)”.
Efforts by drug traffickers to unload the cocaine were unsuccessful. Although they sent a small boat to the south of the so-called Costa da Morte, in Galicia, to try to collect the goods, the Spanish Civil Guard obtained information about the operation and a helicopter and a boat were positioned in the area where the drug landing.
Upon seeing the security agents, the crew of the small boat decided not to attempt the maneuver. And the bad state of the sea allowed the narco-submarine to go unnoticed.
Desperate, without food or drinking water, the crew of “Che” then decided to take the boat to the area of Rías Baixas, on the Galician coast. More specifically, to the Aldán estuary, where the pilot of the “Che” spent his summers as a child and whom he knew very well. “With great skill, because it is a complicated area for navigation, Agustín managed to place the submarine in that estuary and positioned it in front of a cove about 8 meters deep”, says Romero.
At dawn on November 24, the crew turned on the faucet and water began to enter the “Che” until it sank. The three crew jumped into the water, with the idea of returning to collect the drug later. But there was no opportunity. Luis Tomás Benítez Manzaba was arrested shortly afterwards on the same beach. The same fate befell Pedro Roberto Delgado Manzaba, five hours later, on a nearby highway. The captain, Agustín, was arrested five days later in a house in the region where he was hiding.
“When verifying the precariousness and lack of space of the narco-submarine, it was incredible that they managed to reach Spain alive”, in the words of Sergeant Basante, the first policeman to step on the vessel. “I was also inside ‘Che’ and the feeling of claustrophobia was enormous. Being there for 27 days must have been a real psychological torture for the trio”, recalls Romero.
The 152 bales of cocaine would eventually be confiscated by security forces along with the vessel. Agustín and the Manzaba cousins were taken to prison, where they waited for the court sentence. Four other people, including friends with whom the narco-submarine pilot came into contact, are also awaiting a decision on the penalty.
But the drug owners and those who would receive them are still free. And probably preparing new shipments.
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