#CinemaJourney
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Short filmTranscript
00:00In a cartel compound, Mexican police
00:03discovered 14 heavily modified trucks
00:06ready to wage war against rival gangs and the authorities.
00:11Cops have dubbed them monstruos, meaning monsters,
00:14but they're also commonly referred to as narco tanks.
00:17Three men break out of Alcatraz prison in 1962.
00:21The FBI would later discover more than 80 handcrafted tools
00:26used in the escape.
00:27They had stolen or collected more than 50 rubber raincoats
00:31to make life jackets and a 14-foot inflatable raft.
00:37Suspicious power grid issues lead Tennessee police
00:40to an empty home with an underground secret.
00:44Beneath this beautiful house was a massive natural rock cave,
00:48fully outfitted as a subterranean marijuana drill operation.
00:51The world's most inventive criminal minds.
01:01Lawless ingenuity, born out of greed.
01:04From back alleys to the high seas.
01:07secret structures, custom-built vehicles, high-tech innovation.
01:14What happens when engineering genies ends up on the wrong side of the law
01:20and starts building bad?
01:24In June of 2023, Mexican federal authorities raided a drug cartel compound
01:40in the northeastern state of Tamaulipas and discovered 14 trucks
01:44that had been heavily modified to wage war against rival gangs and police alike.
01:50Cops have dubbed them monstruos, meaning monsters,
01:54but they're also commonly referred to as narco tanks.
01:56An apt description because some of them look like homemade military trucks
02:00or something you'd see careening across the desert in Mad Max.
02:03The area where they were found is a hotbed of cartel activity because it's close to the U.S. border,
02:11which gives it strategic value to narcos looking to move drugs into the huge American market.
02:17No fewer than four criminal organizations are vying to control Tamaulipas.
02:24The Gulf Cartel, the Zetas, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, and the Sinaloans.
02:32It's become a violent, lawless war zone, so finding the narco tanks was no big surprise.
02:39What was surprising was the sophistication and ingenuity of the vehicles.
02:45They had come a long way over the past few decades.
02:50The first discovery of a modified narco truck on record happened in 1979 in Miami,
02:56the cocaine capital of America.
02:59It would be linked to one of the most brazen drug slayings in the city's history.
03:05Miami was so violent back then, Scarface might as well have been a documentary.
03:10In 1980, there were more than 500 homicides in the city.
03:14To put that number into perspective, there were only 31 in 2023.
03:21Ruthless drug lords were turning the streets into the Wild West,
03:24and no drug lord was more ruthless than Griselda Blanco, the infamous Colombian godmother.
03:33Following orders from Blanco, on July 11, 1979,
03:37two men emerged from what looked like a standard white delivery truck,
03:41entered a liquor store, and opened fire in broad daylight.
03:47Inside the store was a rival coke trafficker and his bodyguard.
03:50So there's this huge gun battle.
03:52The two targets get killed, and two store employees get wounded.
03:57The incident becomes known as the Daedland Mall Massacre.
04:01Investigators located the delivery truck abandoned at the far end of the mall's parking lot.
04:09Stenciled on the side were the words,
04:12Happy Time Complete Party Supply.
04:15Quite an interesting sense of irony.
04:19Upon closer inspection, the cops discovered the truck was equipped with reinforced steel,
04:23gun portholes, and contained enough automatic weapons and bulletproof vests,
04:28to supply a small army. They dubbed it the war wagon, and the age of the narco tank began.
04:35The 1990s saw the formation of the Los Zetas cartel in Mexico.
04:41They would go on to become one of the most feared and brutal crime syndicates in the country,
04:45and pioneers of the narco tank.
04:47Early Los Zetas members were elite Special Forces soldiers who had deserted from the Mexican army.
04:55At first, about 30 of them acted as personal security for Ocial Cardenas Guillén, the head of the Gulf cartel.
05:03But their numbers soon began to grow, and they eventually became enforcers for the entire cartel.
05:09The Zetas were more like a paramilitary group than a criminal gang.
05:14They were well-trained professionals, with recruits including ex-U.S. Army soldiers,
05:20corrupt federal, state, and local police officers, and former members of the Guatemalan Special Forces.
05:27Following the arrest and extradition to the U.S. of Ocial Cardenas Guillén in 2010,
05:38the Zetas broke ranks with the Gulf cartel and became independent.
05:43At this point, they had more expertise and more influence, so they figured they could make more
05:48money as a separate organization. But that turned out to be a costly decision. The Zetas became Mexico's
05:56public enemy number one, and the increased attention from authorities led to the 30-odd original
06:02members all getting killed or captured or extradited to the U.S.
06:09But like any good criminal organization, there were people more than willing to fill the power
06:15vacuum, and the Zetas expanded quickly, becoming Mexico's largest drug cartel in terms of geographical
06:22dominance. They controlled more than a dozen states, primarily in the eastern parts of the country.
06:32Because of their origins, Los Zetas led the way when it came to adopting military tactics and weapons
06:38into the drug trade. The logical next step was to integrate military-grade vehicles.
06:44As armed clashes with rival cartels and law enforcement became more frequent, the Zetas needed
06:52to protect themselves and their drug shipments. But you can't just walk into a dealership and
06:58buy a tank or an armored truck. So they needed a little DIY magic.
07:03The early versions of narco tanks were fairly basic, little more than lightly modified commercial
07:13vehicles like pickup trucks and SUVs. They would add some internal armoring, bulletproof glass, and
07:19tires to protect against small arms fire and light explosives.
07:22But as the drug war has escalated, cartels and authorities began to use more powerful weaponry,
07:32and the early narco tank designs were rendered ineffective.
07:37The first builds were limited in what they could protect against. Small caliber handguns, no problem.
07:43Even grenades were fine, but they were still vulnerable to rocket launchers and heavy machine gun fire.
07:49The early narco tanks also lacked offensive capabilities, so there was no way of fighting
07:57back if they ever fell under attack. They were sitting ducks.
08:03What you started seeing were so-called Popemobile narco tanks, with pillbox armored firing positions
08:11mounted on the back of the pickup trucks. Basically, they were just big metal boxes with holes in the
08:17side for shooting through. Pretty rudimentary, but they at least allowed the occupants to return
08:22fire when attacked. As the designs of the narco tanks evolved, the cartels began dramatically
08:29increasing the size and complexity of the vehicles. Instead of just using commercial SUVs and pickup trucks,
08:36they started to roll out flatbed trucks, dump trucks, and even tractors. All modified to the nines,
08:41and starting to resemble military vehicles with full exterior armor plating. Heavy-duty trucks that could
08:48bear more weight were also deployed. Known as dualies because they have dual rear wheels, these trucks can
08:57typically haul over 2,000 pounds. And the extra tires come in handy should one get shot out in battle.
09:05You also started to see innovations like huge metal battering rams on the front ends of trucks that
09:12they could use to break down a blockade or break down a gate or even just smash into an enemy vehicle.
09:22The progressive sophistication of the narco tanks shocked authorities and attracted the public's
09:27attention for the capture of a behemoth dubbed Monstro 2010 in the western state of Jalisco.
09:35This thing was crazy. It could transport up to 20 men with assault rifles and the exterior was covered in one inch thick steel that was installed on an upward angle to deflect bullets.
09:52All the glass was taken out and armor plating was put in its place. There was a reinforced turret for a sniper in the front, the tires were protected with a steel plate,
10:02and a bulletproof ring was added to each tire.
10:07There was also a lot of high-tech gadgetry. Satellite communication systems for eavesdropping on law enforcement, devices for creating smoke screens, dropping nails, and oil slicks to fend off anyone chasing them.
10:21It was even equipped with an electrified grill capable of delivering 700 volts of shock power.
10:29But for all its ingenuity, Monstro 2010 still had some pretty serious drawbacks.
10:35Because of all that extra weight, it was pretty slow. It could only go about 30 miles an hour.
10:40It was also hard to maneuver, and it sure wasn't stealthy. And the required retrofitting of all these tank parts resulted in lots of things malfunctioning.
10:49You'd often see them sitting abandoned on the side of the road.
10:55A 2015 raid of a narco truck workshop at a winery in Tamaulipas showed that maybe the cartels were moving away from elaborate builds like Monstro 2010 and scaling designs back in favor of speed and stealth.
11:09They found 13 vehicles, eight of which were in the process of being outfitted with protection.
11:14But instead of massive military-like vehicles, these were mostly commercial pickup trucks.
11:19There was extensive machinery for cutting and fabricating metal, work likely done by mechanics with years of experience modifying cartel vehicles to smuggle drugs across the U.S. border.
11:31An arsenal of ammunition was also discovered in the shop.
11:35AK-47 magazines, .308 Winchester rounds, and heavy-duty .50 caliber ammo used in Barrett sniper rifles and M2 Browning machine guns.
11:47These are substantial guns, and based on other narco tank builds, the authorities speculated that they likely would have been mounted in the truck beds.
11:55In November of 2023, a discovery by Mexican authorities revealed that the cartels are now outfitting narco tanks to keep up with the latest weapons technology, drones.
12:11It was a modified four-door Dodge Ram that had been improvised with a metal screen mounted over the hood and cab to protect from aerial drone strikes, which are being used increasingly by the cartels.
12:28In the military, they're called Cope cages, and they first appeared on Russian tanks just before the invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
12:38Now, they're widely used on both sides of that conflict, and they've been seen on Israeli defense force tanks in the Middle East.
12:45While some of the engineering may not be as audacious as seen in the monstros of a decade ago, the statistics suggest that narco tanks aren't going away altogether any time soon.
12:59In Tamaulipas alone, more than 260 armored trucks were confiscated and destroyed by the authorities between 2019 and the first half of 2023.
13:11Narco tanks have become this weird status symbol for the younger generation of cartel members.
13:18You can see them in TikTok videos and other social media, usually with some rap song or some ballad, glamorizing the narco lifestyle.
13:28Cartels have taken to decorating trucks with their initials or cutting-edge camouflage patterns, sometimes making it very difficult to tell them apart from legitimate military vehicles.
13:39And they're pretty proud of their results.
13:41Some gangs have even released YouTube videos showing off their narco tanks and weaponry as veiled threats to cartel rivals and the authorities.
13:53As for the 14 trucks discovered at the compound in Tamaulipas in June of 2023, they were demolished in the border city of Reynosa.
14:03A small dent in the armor protecting the cartels, precious cargo.
14:09On the morning of June 12, 1962, prison guards doing the morning rounds at the notorious Alcatraz prison in San Francisco Bay discovered something shocking.
14:29Three missing inmates.
14:30Two brothers, Clarence and John Anglin, along with a third man named Frank Morris, were not in their beds.
14:39The facility immediately went into lockdown.
14:41Sirens wailed across the bay and a panicked search for the missing men kicked off.
14:46This is Alcatraz, the supposedly inescapable fortress.
14:53Before 1962, there were 12 escape attempts involving a total of 31 men.
14:59Now, 20 of those were surrendered or recaptured.
15:03Eight of them were shot and killed and three drowned.
15:06That's 100% failure rate.
15:08It's called the rock for a reason.
15:14It's a slab of stone spanning around 22 acres, roughly a mile and a half offshore from San Francisco.
15:22The water in the bay is frigid, dipping as low as 48 degrees Fahrenheit, and the currents are treacherous.
15:33So, even if one were able to escape the prison, getting safely to the shore was always thought to be an impossibility.
15:41Prior to its incarnation as a home to some of America's most infamous criminals, Alcatraz Island served as a military installation for many years.
15:54The U.S. federal government acquired Alcatraz in 1849 and built a fortress to guard San Francisco Bay, which was overrun with fortune hunters because of the gold rush.
16:03But although the fort was originally built to protect against outsiders, its most important period was during the Civil War, when it began to house military prisoners.
16:13This would eventually become its sole purpose.
16:16In 1909, inmates were put to work constructing an ambitious new complex.
16:21And upon its completion in 1912, it was the largest steel-reinforced concrete building in the world.
16:29It had 600 cells, each of which was just five by nine feet.
16:35The U.S. Department of Justice took over the operation of Alcatraz in 1933 and set about modernizing the buildings and improving security.
16:44The cell bars were strengthened and guard towers were strategically placed around the island.
16:49A year later, the most famous federal prison in American history began taking in the country's worst offenders.
17:01Early residents of Alcatraz were some of the most storied criminals of the day, including Al Capone and Machine Gun Kelly.
17:09But the door was always open to anonymous scoundrels like the Anglin brothers and Frank Morris.
17:14Morris was convicted of his first crime at the tender age of 13.
17:22By his late teens, his rap sheet would boast of a wide range of offenses, from narcotics possession to armed robbery.
17:30He was in and out of institutions his whole life, starting with reform school and then graduating to adult penitentiaries.
17:38For John and Clarence Anglin, crime was a family affair.
17:44They had been convicted of bank robbery, along with their brother Alfred, and sent to the federal penitentiary in Atlanta.
17:50The three men shared an enthusiasm for escape.
17:54And in 1960, officials sent Morris to Alcatraz after a series of failed breakout attempts.
18:00The Anglin brothers later followed him to the rock, when the authorities grew tired of their escape bids, too.
18:08The thing about Alcatraz is it didn't just house the country's most brutal criminals.
18:13It's also where they sent inmates who had tried to escape from other prisons.
18:18It was pretty much the end of the line for men with itchy feet and grand schemes.
18:22So it makes perfect sense that the Anglin brothers and Frank Morris would reunite there.
18:26On the morning the men went missing, a guard went to Morris' cell when he didn't respond to the wake-up bell.
18:34A poke of the inmate left the guard in shock when a dummy head rolled off the bed and onto the ground.
18:42Every 24 hours at Alcatraz, they did 13 head counts.
18:46And that meant that if anybody was trying to escape, they needed some way to fool the guards into thinking they were still in their cells, so they had enough time to run.
18:54In a bit of crude jailhouse ingenuity, the head was fashioned mostly out of sand and cement mix.
19:01The outside was then covered with a layer of white cement paint, and then painted further with flesh tones taken from the prison's art supplies.
19:09It even had human hair attached, likely collected from the prison barbershop, complete with eyebrows and eyelashes.
19:17There was even an ear attached that was surprisingly realistic-looking, right down to the shape of the folds and a hole.
19:25The Anglin brothers occupied cells adjacent to Morris, so it wasn't long before the guards discovered two more dummy heads in place of the missing inmates.
19:37While John Anglin's head was similar in composition to the one found in Morris' cell, Clarence's was made of soap layered over white cotton rags and toilet paper.
19:46With a sculptor's touch, he molded the soap into facial features and then painted over it.
19:53All the heads were only decorated on one side, and they were set up on the pillow facing the middle of the cell.
19:59And where the body was supposed to be, they used watered-up blankets and long underwear.
20:04As the authorities frantically searched the cells, they discovered that the three men had slipped out through ventilation grates on the back wall.
20:14The grates were only 5 inches by 9 inches, far too small for anyone to fit through.
20:21But what they did was gradually puncture holes in the walls surrounding the opening using homemade tools like sharpened spoons and even a makeshift drill made from a vacuum cleaner motor.
20:37Most of his work would have been performed during happy hour, when the prisoners were allowed to play musical instruments,
20:43and the sound would have drowned out whatever noise the Anglin brothers and Morris were making in their cell.
20:48They would hide their progress with cardboard inserts painted to look like the wall, or just put objects in front of the opening.
20:57Once through the wall, they were able to access a narrow utility corridor, and from there, they climbed up a plumbing fixture to a landing on top of the cell block
21:05that served as their secret workshop in the months leading up to their disappearance.
21:11This is where they would have made the dummy heads and fashioned their tools.
21:15A homemade periscope cobbled together using canvas board, tape, and mirrors was discovered, presumably used to keep an eye out for guards.
21:25It was common knowledge among the prisoners that there were eight unused ventilator holes leading up to the roof above the cell blocks,
21:34but they were rumored to be cemented up.
21:37A man named Alan West, who helped plan the escape attempt, but ultimately didn't participate,
21:43had access to the landing area to do maintenance work.
21:46While painting one day, he noticed a ventilator hole that wasn't sealed over with concrete, a possible way out.
21:55The ceiling was about 30 feet above the landing area, but there were these pipes that the men could climb to get up there.
22:01Thing was, though, to get it onto the roof, you'd have to remove a covering that was heavily bolted down, so that was a huge challenge.
22:08They would need some more DIY inventiveness, and West was able to supply it.
22:14He managed to engineer a wrench by removing clamps from his bed and bolting them together,
22:19which he successfully used to loosen the bolts on the ventilator cover.
22:23It was left in place so that nothing would appear out of the ordinary until they made their dash for freedom.
22:28But how were they going to possibly make it off the island and onto the shore?
22:34Historically, that's a suicide mission.
22:37Upon discovering the workshop, authorities came across several items that seemed to be fashioned out of standard prison-issue raincoats.
22:46Alan West would later tell the authorities that they had stolen or collected more than 50 rubber raincoats
22:52that they cut up and glued or stitched together to make life jackets and a 14-foot inflatable raft.
22:59And they even used hot steam pipes to vulcanize the rubber to make it stronger and more elastic.
23:06Building a makeshift raft and life jackets out of raincoats is an impressive feat.
23:10But how they managed to inflate these things is truly genius.
23:15A month before the escape attempt, Clarence Anglin had ordered a concertina,
23:21a musical instrument similar to an accordion.
23:25They removed the keys, inserted a valve, and then used it as an air pump.
23:29How they even thought of that is beyond me.
23:32I suppose sitting in jail with nothing to do but plot your escape sparked some creative juices.
23:39With no sign of the escapees on Alcatraz,
23:42authorities took their search to the frigid waters of San Francisco Bay.
23:47Several law enforcement and military branches were brought in.
23:51Including the Coast Guard and the FBI.
23:55A bunch of stuff was found in the water.
23:57Two life jackets, pieces of a makeshift wooden paddle,
24:01a waterproof package belonging to the Anglins that had a bunch of names and addresses and photographs in it,
24:08and also a letter.
24:09According to Alan West, they'd intended to paddle the raft to Angel Island,
24:15roughly two miles north of Alcatraz.
24:18Once there, they would sink the raft, get some rest,
24:21then swim to the mainland from the other side of the island.
24:25The Anglin brothers and Frank Morris were never seen or heard from again.
24:30Whether the escape was successful,
24:32or they perished in San Francisco Bay,
24:34has been the subject of rampant speculation over the years.
24:38The odds of them surviving the cold water and strong currents in a homemade raft are pretty slim.
24:46Also, they planned to steal a car and rob a clothing store,
24:51and yet no such incidents were reported.
24:54Some have theorized that maybe someone picked them up in a boat,
24:59but it would have been virtually impossible to coordinate with limited communication
25:03between the inmates and the outside world.
25:06But there's a catch.
25:08The bodies were never found.
25:10And as long as there's no concrete evidence that those men died that night,
25:14people will always embrace the idea that they did what no one thought was possible.
25:19That maybe they escaped from Alcatraz.
25:24The FBI recovered over 80 homemade tools used in the breakout,
25:30a testament to the jailhouse ingenuity of the Anglin brothers, Allen West, and Frank Morris.
25:37The Bureau officially closed its case on December 31st, 1979,
25:42and turned it over to the U.S. Marshals Service,
25:45where it's still considered an open and active investigation.
25:54In December of 2005, a series of power grid issues in the Trousdale, Tennessee area
26:05prompted an inspection by the local utility company.
26:10They discovered that a series of unauthorized wires
26:13had been spliced into a main power line on Dixon Springs Road
26:17and connected to a nearby property.
26:20The authorities were summoned to investigate.
26:25Police responded, expecting to deal with a routine violation,
26:28but were met with something unexpected.
26:31The house was empty, without a single piece of furniture or window covering.
26:35On December 14th, the house was raided by national and local law enforcement agencies,
26:41hoping to find out what was going on.
26:45Investigators confirmed that the home had never been lived in,
26:48and quickly realized why.
26:50The home was actually a front for a major drug operation
26:55that until now, no one had even suspected.
27:01Beneath this beautiful house was a massive natural rock cave.
27:05But it wasn't just any cave.
27:07It was a cave fully outfitted as a subterranean marijuana grow operation.
27:12It was an enormous criminal enterprise,
27:15and a lair befitting a classic Hollywood villain.
27:19With 15 to 20 foot ceilings,
27:21and 20,000 square feet of floor space,
27:23teeming with thriving marijuana plants,
27:26the cave stretched from under the house
27:28to the interior of Cato Mountain behind it.
27:32Around five years before this bust,
27:35a man named Fred Strunk had purchased the property
27:38to build a dream home for his wife.
27:41The natural cave actually drew them to the property
27:44with the hope that it could be turned into a storm shelter.
27:47Unfortunately, his wife passed away before the home could be completed.
27:51Strunk understandably lost interest in the home after her death
27:56and listed the spectacular, yet unfinished property for sale.
28:01After a short time, a buyer did come forward,
28:04but he was far more interested in a bizarre deal than the home itself.
28:07Strunk stated that he was hired by this man
28:12to transform the site from a safety-conscious dream house
28:15into a money-making pot operation.
28:17A $50,000 a month deal that Strunk couldn't refuse.
28:22Strunk was an engineer with no criminal record,
28:28but he was seduced by the prospect of a substantial payday
28:31and loved a challenge,
28:33so he set his mind on turning the underground cave
28:36into a sophisticated grow operation.
28:39The first step was to design and construct a hidden entryway.
28:44Inside the home's basement garage,
28:48Strunk built a fake storage closet to conceal the access way.
28:52The wall at the back of the closet was then cut out
28:55and mounted to a hydraulic system that turned the storage area
28:59into a remote-operated door to the inner working of the cave.
29:03From inside the garage, no one would ever suspect
29:06that the closet had a massive steel and cinder block reinforced door.
29:11When activated, the door opened to a landing
29:15that connected to a cinder block and concrete
29:1810-foot square, 40-foot long, descending hallway.
29:24Strunk laid a massive, continuous wood floor to level the space.
29:29He then divided the large open cavern into functional rooms
29:33that would be needed when the space was operational.
29:37At the front of the cave, Strunk designed a bunk room
29:41kitchen and bathroom for the crew that would eventually be required
29:44to manage the operation.
29:47And at the back, he built a storage area for tools and equipment.
29:52With these things out of the way,
29:54Strunk had to face his first hurdle,
29:56how to supply light to a dark cave
29:59so that the plants would grow.
30:03People have been growing plants in controlled environments
30:06under electric lights for over 150 years.
30:09The earliest attempts date back to the 1860s,
30:12and the term electro-horticulture was coined in the 1880s.
30:16Since then, scientists have developed fluorescent lighting,
30:20which emits a broader spectrum of light
30:21to improve controlled growing outputs.
30:24The lighting system in the cave was divided into different areas,
30:30as required by the needs of the marijuana plants.
30:33The front room, where the seedlings were,
30:36contained mostly overhead fluorescent lighting,
30:39while the back room used high-intensity discharge,
30:42or HID lights.
30:43As soon as the young plants were ready,
30:48they graduated to this room,
30:50where the lights offered a spectrum of light
30:52that more closely resembled the sun.
30:56The HID lights also gave off a lot more heat,
30:59which is beneficial to the climate control of the environment,
31:02but required finesse so the plants wouldn't burn.
31:05Strunk rigged these lights to an elaborate pulley system
31:07so that they could maintain a safe distance from the plants
31:10as they grew.
31:11The lights, in combination with ventilation and circulation systems,
31:17kept the room at the perfect temperature, 87 degrees.
31:23Having seemingly solved the lighting dilemma,
31:26Strunk faced another challenge, water.
31:30Proper and consistent irrigation was a necessity.
31:34Strunk could have done this in a couple of ways.
31:37Either he pulled water from the county system
31:39that the house had been connected to,
31:42or there was a natural well on the property near the cave,
31:46plentiful enough to support the system.
31:49In the end, regardless of source,
31:52Strunk was able to run enough water to the cave
31:55that they could grow up to a thousand plants at once.
31:59What he figured out resulted in thousands of feet of tubing
32:04run back and forth throughout the cave
32:06with drip systems for each and every plant.
32:09And to make things easier while maximizing plant growth,
32:13the choice was made to grow the plants entirely hydroponically.
32:17The plants were grown in buckets with a mineral-rich broth.
32:26Strunk was the architect of the cave
32:28and an engineer by training,
32:30not a marijuana farmer.
32:32So outside labor was required
32:34to run the extensive operation.
32:36But a large number of people coming and going
32:40from the house every day
32:42would obviously draw unwanted attention.
32:45So he had to devise a solution.
32:49Experienced migrant farm workers were recruited in Arizona
32:53and driven in secrecy to the Tennessee property.
32:56These men were taken to the cave blindfolded
32:59and then sealed inside to work.
33:01But sealing people inside an underground cave
33:04carried some obvious risks.
33:07With all the electrical activity,
33:09fire was a serious concern.
33:11Not to mention any unexpected visit from the authorities
33:14could result in dozens of arrests.
33:18Strunk had one last trick up his sleeve
33:20to address these issues.
33:23Resting in the corner of the front room of the cave
33:25was a ladder.
33:27It didn't really attract much attention
33:29because the ceiling above it just looked like rock.
33:31But really, it led to a long, wide,
33:34corrugated steel pipe with a built-in ladder
33:37that led directly to the yard
33:39of the A-frame house above.
33:42At the top of the pipe was a hatch
33:44operated by a heavy-duty,
33:46hand-cranked hydraulic lift
33:47to ensure that the seal was very secure.
33:49From the ground, it was hidden by a false boulder
33:52that laid just 100 yards from the back of the house.
33:56Strunk tried to think of everything.
33:58There were even low-tech booby traps
34:00like spiked boards scattered around the property
34:02to discourage any trespassers.
34:06By the time the electric company and police
34:08finally caught on to Strunk nearly five years later,
34:12the operation had already paid for itself
34:14several times over.
34:17Based on the estimated output of the pot cave
34:20at the time it was discovered,
34:21the setup he created amounted to 100 pounds of marijuana
34:26every eight weeks.
34:28That worked out to 12 to 14 crops per year
34:31with a value of half a million dollars per crop.
34:34The cave was producing six to eight million dollars a year.
34:37But in the end, Strunk's dream home turned into a nightmare.
34:44For now, the property, or what's left of it, remains empty.
34:50A reminder to the community that you can never really know
34:54what goes on behind closed doors.
34:56After the December 2005 raid,
35:01three men, including Fred Strunk, were arrested.
35:05Strunk received the longest sentence of 18 years,
35:08despite his clean record.
35:10Prosecutors didn't believe this was his first time being involved
35:14in such a complex drug operation,
35:16a damaging endorsement of his engineering genius.
35:21The mysterious man who hired Strunk to build the marijuana farm
35:25was never brought to justice.
35:37On October 20, 2017, near the town of Salamanca,
35:42Mexican Federal Police pulled over a suspected stolen SUV.
35:47The four passengers were identified as members
35:50of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, or CJNG,
35:55and promptly arrested.
35:57A search of the SUV revealed a bizarre
36:00and unexpected piece of cargo.
36:03Inside the trunk of that vehicle, next to an AK-47,
36:07was a high-tech quadcopter drone ready to deploy.
36:10And not just that, it was crudely rigged
36:13with a dangerous homemade explosive payload.
36:16This seizure marked the first time weaponized drones
36:20had been found in the hands of the cartel.
36:23Known as a narco drone,
36:25this discovery was seen as a major warning sign
36:28to Mexican and American authorities.
36:34Portable quadcopter drones surged in popularity
36:37among hobbyists during the mid to late 2000s.
36:40And in 2010, a French company released the first
36:44Wi-Fi-controlled, commercially successful consumer version.
36:49Other companies would later release improved designs
36:52featuring high-quality video cameras and machine learning
36:55capable of tracking ground-level objects or people.
36:59The surveillance capabilities would have been a clear selling point
37:03for the cartels.
37:04With little effort, they could be used to track sensitive shipments,
37:09spy on competitors and authorities,
37:11or be deployed as lookouts or scouts
37:14to assess the viability of trade routes.
37:16Even the most basic models had real-time video
37:21to track the movement of border agents or authorities
37:23in order to establish better time transports
37:25or clear illegal border crossings.
37:28It's believed that up to 10,000 narco drones
37:31crossed the U.S.-Mexico border in 2022 alone.
37:35But given the adaptability of drone technology,
37:37surveillance isn't their only use in this setting.
37:40Drug trafficking is a multi-billion dollar annual business
37:44for cartels.
37:45They produce, package, and transport illegal drugs
37:49from Mexico and South America across the border
37:52into the U.S. by any means necessary.
37:56There have been many strategies employed over the years
37:59by the cartels to evade commercial ports of entry,
38:02But the arrival of readily available drone technology
38:06offered a unique opportunity for the cartels
38:09to navigate these physical barriers
38:11with less regard for geographic limitations.
38:15They bought up all the state-of-the-art drones
38:17they could find, from a couple hundred bucks
38:19to a few thousand dollars,
38:20tested their range, their navigation,
38:23their payload capacity,
38:24all to see which ones could best add
38:27to the cartel's tool chest.
38:29On average, small hobby drones can carry
38:32between one to four pounds,
38:33while the largest commercial drones
38:35have the ability to carry up to 44 pounds.
38:38The cartels, used to sacrificing entire boats,
38:41planes, and people to their cause,
38:43were not shy about pushing the drones
38:44to their max ability.
38:48In June of 2015, authorities tracked a drone
38:52that made multiple cross-border trips
38:54to drop bubble-wrapped packages of heroin
38:57into California.
38:58A person awaiting delivery used a radio controller
39:02to command the drone to drop the packages
39:04when it reached its destination.
39:07It took several hours and three successful trips,
39:10but by the end, nearly 30 pounds of heroin,
39:13with a street value of around one and a half million dollars,
39:17got into the hands of traffickers in the U.S.
39:19It's believed that around 1,000 drones
39:25are flown over the U.S.-Mexico border every week
39:29to drop packages of drugs
39:31or act as decoys to confuse authorities.
39:35Drones used to smuggle drugs
39:36are difficult to track and capture
39:38because traditional radar systems
39:39were designed to track high-speed, high-altitude planes.
39:43Drones have lower radar and heat signatures.
39:46They travel much closer to the ground,
39:47and at an average speed of 40 to 65 miles an hour,
39:51to many of these systems, they appear as just birds.
39:55While drone trafficking has clearly been successful,
39:58and it's still a tactic used by the cartels today,
40:01it's not the only application of this growing technology.
40:04In July of 2018,
40:08two narco drones with crudely rigged fragmentation grenades
40:12duct taped to their bodies
40:13attempted to attack the house of a government official
40:16in the Mexican state of Baja, California.
40:20Only one managed to make it onto the property,
40:23and it crashed without detonating.
40:26Taping explosives to a drone is one approach,
40:29but handcrafted bombs seem to work for the cartels just as well.
40:32Using a light explosive base
40:35with a combination of readily available household items
40:37like tape or glue,
40:39and then the addition of SIM cards and burner phones
40:41as detonators,
40:43you can turn a trafficking drone
40:45into an attack drone overnight.
40:47The first weaponized attack drone,
40:52found in the hands of the Halesko New Generation cartel,
40:56used this very strategy.
40:58A homemade, improvised explosive,
41:01wrapped in tape,
41:02was strung to the drone.
41:05No matter how advanced the drone technology may be,
41:09the modifications remain low-tech.
41:12The bomb was a specific kind of homemade explosives
41:15called Papa Bomba,
41:17or Potato Bomb.
41:18They get their name from the layers of duct tape
41:20wrapped around their rounded, hand-formed shape
41:23that resembles a literal baked potato.
41:27Potato bombs have an inner core
41:29made of a malleable explosive substance
41:31in the form of a putty
41:32that is then packed with metal objects
41:34like nails or pieces of scrap
41:36that become shrapnel when the bomb explodes.
41:42Narco drones can be rigged either of two ways.
41:45You can have a release mechanism
41:46so the drone flies in,
41:48deploys the weapon,
41:49and then comes back to get more.
41:51Or you can have a weapon
41:53permanently attached to the drone,
41:54and then when it goes in,
41:55it doesn't come back.
41:57But buying and physically adapting the drones
42:01is only one aspect of mastering this technology.
42:04In 2021, the CJNG invested in the development
42:15of a 12-man team called Operadores Droneros.
42:19They are an elite squad of expert drone operators
42:22trained by American explosive experts
42:25and Colombian drone pilots.
42:26This team is narco-drone warfare down to a science.
42:33Safely from miles away,
42:35they can confirm the presence or the location of the target
42:37and then drop the payload or explode the drone
42:40with a high degree of accuracy.
42:41On November 27th, 2022,
42:50the CJNG launched an audacious attack
42:53on Mexican authorities in the state of Jalisco,
42:56firing on them from a Cessna airplane,
42:58while multiple drones dropped homemade explosives.
43:01In response to rising violence,
43:10in 2023, Mexican President Obrador
43:14proposed new legislation
43:16that would equip Mexican law enforcement
43:19with more funding
43:20and charge anyone caught in possession
43:23of a narco-drone
43:24with up to 60 years in prison.
43:27Mexican authorities would later speculate
43:30that the four CJNG members
43:32caught with a weaponized drone
43:34in the SUV near Salamanca in 2017
43:37were likely headed for Saleya,
43:39a nearby city where dismembered corpses
43:42have been turning up regularly.
43:45If not for the intervention of the police,
43:48more blood would have been spilled
43:50on Mexico's already crimson streets.
44:00.
44:02.
44:07.
44:08.