HONOLULU, Hawaii (Island News) — From paradise to patrol, a Honolulu-based Coast Guard crew just hauled in $156 million worth of cocaine from the high seas.
The crew aboard the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Midgett, homeported in Honolulu, recently returned from a 79-day counterdrug patrol across the Eastern Pacific called Operation Pacific Viper, a mission that reads like an action movie, but this one was all too real.
The Midgett’s crew intercepted four smuggling vessels, detained 19 suspects and seized more than 21,000 pounds of cocaine during the two-and-a-half-month mission.
The drugs were later transferred to federal authorities in San Diego, while the smuggling boats were sunk at sea…