[Doglips]

Just something to help people relax on their flight...we Floridians think of everything


Cocaine Found In Snack Peanut Bags On Flight To Florida

POSTED: 6:58 a.m. EST October 31, 2003
UPDATED: 6:59 a.m. EST October 31, 2003

MIAMI -- Federal investigators Thursday found about $20,000 worth of cocaine disguised as snack-sized bags of peanuts on an Avianca flight from Colombia to Miami.

No passengers on the plane ate any of the 51 bags of peanuts that held a total of 2.6 pounds of the drug, said Zach Mann, a spokesman for the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection.

Avianca flight 2 from Baranquilla, Colombia, landed at Miami International Airport around 12:45 p.m., he said.

A drug-sniffing dog doing a routine search of the plane alerted agents to the presence of drugs in the galley, Mann said. Investigators noticed the peanut bags "didn't feel right," so they opened them up and found the drugs, Mann said.

"Our concern is that people who eat them just rip the bags open and pop them in their mouths," Mann said. "For all practical matters it would have killed them."

No one has been arrested and officials were trying to determine who loaded the peanuts on the plane and where they came from, Mann said.

Avianca officials in Miami did not return a telephone message seeking comment.

In 1990, a man died after drinking liquid cocaine disquised as a Latin American soft drink. The drink had been smuggled into Miami in whosesale-sized cases from Colombia and the smugglers inadvertantly let some get into the retail market.
Copyright 2003 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.