Federal authorities have intercepted a record amount of the potentially deadly opioid fentanyl, hidden inside machinery sent to Melbourne.
The Australia Federal Police (AFP) and Australia Border Force (ABF) today announced the seizure of 11 kilograms of fentanyl and 30kg of methamphetamine found inside an industrial wooden lathe — machinery used for wood or metal working — that arrived at the Port of Melbourne from Canada in December last year.
The AFP says it was the equivalent of more than 5 million potentially lethal doses of fentanyl and $27 million worth of methamphetamine.
Australia has only ever recorded illicit fentanyl importations of less than 30g, with the first case in 2017.
"So to have a detection of 11kg pure is just quite frankly extraordinary," ABF Commander James Watson said.
Fentanyl is a fast-acting opioid that is highly addictive and acts on the same receptors in the body as heroin.
The drug is primarily used for medical purposes, but the AFP says it can be mixed with heroin in overseas illicit drug markets, often with fatal consequences.
Commander Watson said there was a "fentanyl epidemic" in some parts of the world, causing thousands of deaths a year.
"The audacity of the group behind this is just quite frankly outrageous. I'd describe it as a total act of bastardry."
He said fentanyl has not been found on Australian streets in the same quantities as overseas.
"We've all been living through COVID over the past few years, it's tough enough as it is let alone to see this kind of impact reaching the streets that we live in and that's why we'll work with our law enforcement partners and Home Affairs colleagues to prevent these kinds of importations from reaching the streets."
AFP acting Commander Anthony Hall said organised criminal networks were targeting Australia for higher profits.
"It's well known that the Australian community, unfortunately, pays higher amounts of money for all types of drugs that are imported into the country," he said.
"Organised crime are the parasites amongst our community and they do it just for financial gain."
"People who use illicit drugs can never be certain of what they are ingesting and this seizure highlights the potentially lethal game of Russian roulette that they play," he said.
Delicate operation for police and Border Force officers
Investigations to confirm the presence of the drugs and extract them from the machinery took place in a carefully planned, two-week operation in February.
Commander Watson said ABF maritime and enforcement officers sent the shipment to be X-rayed after becoming suspicious about its contents.
He said the lathe was carefully removed, allowing investigators to note poor-quality welding and touch-up paint on its base.
Officers discovered the illicit substances after drilling into the machinery.
"This drug is one of the more dangerous drugs that our officers can come into contact with so they acted immediately to set up an exclusion zone within the container examination facility," Commander Watson said.
He said they put on extra personal protective equipment, and set up decontamination zones in case of exposure and rostered paramedics to be on hand throughout the operation.
"We then called the Australia Federal Police and said look, you might want to come down and have a look at this."
He said by that stage, they had some idea there was a large quantity of illicit drugs inside.
"But frankly, we were absolutely shocked by the size of the detection and the audacity of this attempted importation."
The AFP, ABF and the department of Home Affairs have established a joint operation to identify those responsible for importing the fentanyl.
Acting Commander Hall said details of the seizure were only being released now because of the significance, complexity and sensitivity of the on-going investigation.
No arrests have been made and authorities are urging anyone with information to speak to Crimestoppers.
“Someone out there knows something," Commander Hall said.
