Marijuana Drops From the Sky Like a Shrink-Wrapped Bomb

A 26-pound, shrink-wrapped bundle of marijuana dropped out of the Arizona sky and bombed a Nogales residence, blasting a hole in a carport roof and busting up a doghouse.

The Nogales Police Department said the marijuana bundle probably fell from an ultra-light plane, according to KSAZ-TV. It caused roughly $500 damage.

Authorities said such drug drops by small planes are common, but they often occur on the outskirts of cities or in the desert, reported CNN.

Detective Robert Ferros said the bundle had a street value of about $10,000 and "was actually kind of light" for what his department has run across in the past.

"We have seen bundles of marijuana being carried by ultralight aircraft weighing several hundred or a thousand pounds," he said.

The home's owners told police they heard a noise just after midnight on Sept. 8 and thought it was thunder. They found the bundle after dawn.

Ferros said drug dealers sometimes use catapults to launch drug packages from the Mexico side of the border into the United States. The home where the bundle was found is about 1,000 feet from Mexico, wrote CNN.

The Los Angeles Times said Mexican drug cartels were turning more to drones to transport drugs into the United States, citing U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency sources.

According an anonymous DEA source, the criminal organizations have been using drones since 2011, but until recently have recruited more skilled workers to operate them effectively.

The DEA source said drones have proven to be less expensive to smuggle drugs compared to tunnels or underwater vehicles. They also can evade detection by U.S. law enforcement radar easier.

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