Border Force officers have seized approximately one tonne of cocaine with an estimated street value of £80 million during an operation at London Gateway port in Essex. The discovery was made on Friday, prompting an investigation by the National Crime Agency (NCA).
The drugs were found packaged in several holdalls inside a shipping container that had arrived from Panama. The container also held a legitimate cover load of ceramics and kitchenware and was destined for Norway, officials said. The NCA believes the haul would have been worth around £80 million if sold on UK streets.
NCA senior investigating officer Paul Orchard said: "This was a fantastic seizure by our colleagues at Border Force, and taking this amount of cocaine out of circulation will have deprived the organised criminals involved of millions in profits. At this point we don't believe the UK was the end destination for this consignment, but we are working with international partners to identify the routing and target those involved. Those investigations continue."
The seizure comes after police revealed earlier this month that they had recovered an "unusual" collection of items, including a gold bar, a gold suitcase, and gold teeth, during a week-long operation targeting drug gangs. The operation led to over 2,000 arrests, with nearly 10 per cent of those detained being children, some as young as 14.
Officers also closed 335 "drug lines" suspected of distributing heroin, cocaine, and spice-laced vapes. Separately, police seizures of cocaine reached a record high last year, with 23,706 seizures logged in the year to March 2025, up 13 per cent from the previous year. Border Force and police forces intercepted drugs on a record-breaking 269,000 occasions, an increase of 24 per cent.
