Police arrest three smugglers after narcopatera spotted off north Tenerife coast

[aspasia]

I've posted before about the "narcopateras", small zodiac-type drugs-smuggling boats that have been found around the coast of Tenerife (see HERE): often they have been abandoned after the drugs were successfully brought into the island. Yesterday, the Policía Nacional arrested three smugglers after receiving reports from a member of the public that such a craft had been spotted on the north Tenerife coast at Punta de Hidalgo. The three had abandoned the drugs and tried to flee but after a police search involving a helicopter, they were located in a nearby plantation and arrested. A large quantity of drugs has also been taken into custody, as well as the boat, and two vans that the smugglers had been about to use. JAA