Tiny robots to prowl US-Mexico border's dark drug tunnels

[Geee]

Christian Science Monitor:

The nation's increasingly high-tech battle against drug smuggling along the Southwest border just got another ally: a wireless, compact, camera-equipped robot.

 

Although the military for years has relied on robots for reconnaissance in conflict zones, the technology is fairly new on the US-Mexico border, where reinforced land, air and water surveillance has sent traffickers underground.

 

Since 1990, authorities have discovered 168 tunnels in Arizona and California used mostly to smuggle drugs. More than half were dug up along the border stretch in Nogales, Ariz., where covert diggers often breach an underground flood-control system to enter the US.

 

"We've found all types of contraband in Nogales," border patrol Agent Kevin Hecht says. "We've had marijuana, we've had cocaine, we've had heroine, we've had some meth."