RANDOM
The scene is like something out of a Hollywood blockbuster: a high-speed boat chase ensues across the choppy waters of the Mediterranean off the southern coast of Spain, a helicopter following from above. The boat desperately avoiding capture belongs to drug smugglers, the boat in pursuit — sirens wailing — is a police vessel. Suddenly, the two boats collide, the police boat spins “out of control” and the three officers aboard are thrown into the sea. If this were a Hollywood film, the baddies would high-five and roar off into the distance. But what happens next goes decidedly off-script.
Observing the action from the air, a member of the helicopter crew grabs a megaphone and urges the drug gang to rescue the police officers. To everyone’s surprise, the drug boat promptly circles around and the villains pull the officers from the sea. “The crew of the helicopter of the Malaga Air Unit, upon realising the imminent danger to the civil guards, required the occupants of the other vessel to support them by public address, being rescued by them and being all unharmed,” said a police spokesperson.
However, the goodwill gesture turned bad for the smugglers. Having recovered more than 80 bundles of hashish, weighing more than three tonnes, from the sea, the police officers duly arrested the drug gang. “The four occupants of the boat were arrested on suspicion of drug smuggling and the bundles containing cannabis resin confiscated,” added the spokesperson. The drugs had been smuggled from Morocco and were due to be offloaded on the Costa del Sol for distribution in Spain and possibly other parts of Europe.