More than $1.6 million worth of cocaine washed up on Florida beaches during Hurricane Debby, authorities say

Hurricane Debby left behind not only a trail of deadly destruction in the Southeast last week but also more than 100 pounds of narcotics that were discovered along Florida’s shores, authorities say.

Hurricane Debby left behind not only a trail of deadly destruction in the Southeast last week but also more than 100 pounds of narcotics, discovered along Florida’s shores, authorities said. On August 4, 25 packages of cocaine were found on a beach in Islamorada, a village in the Florida Keys about 80 miles from Key West, according to a social media post from the US Customs and Border Patrol in Miami. A good Samaritan alerted authorities after coming across the packages, which weighed about 70 pounds and contained cocaine with an estimated street value of more than $1 million, the agency said. Samuel Briggs, the acting chief patrol agent of the US Border Patrol’s Miami sector, shared a photo on X, showing the large quantity of seized drugs. A week later on Monday, the Collier County Sheriff’s Office said another batch of cocaine – more than half a million dollars’ worth – was found floating near Everglades City, in the Gulf of Mexico. Collier County Sheriff Kevin Rambosk credited good Samaritan boaters for reporting the narcotics they discovered floating in the mangroves off Panther Key, the agency said in a Facebook post Monday.