CANNABIS with an estimated street value of $10 million has been eradicated from the local area after police made the significant bust on Friday.
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Specialist officers have severely hampered the regions drug trade following the seizure and destruction of approximately 4900 cannabis plants.
Drug Squad detectives were assisted by local police and the NSW Police Air Wing in detecting and dismantling the plants and the sophisticated systems which had kept them thriving in remote bush.
Police uncovered the crop sites in Tenterfield, Deepwater, Gibraltar Range National Park, Red Range, Dundee and near Glen Innes.
Inspector Roger Best from the New England Local Area Command said the seizure had prevented the illegal cannabis landing on our streets.
“The quantity of cannabis seized makes it clear that these plants were purely for a commercial purpose,” Inspector Best said.
“No doubt they would have hit the streets of our communities in the New Year.”
Inspector Best said the perpetrators had gone to extensive lengths to conceal the setups.
“The infrastructure used to cultivate these plants was very sophisticated with camouflaged water reservoirs and buried irrigation pipes.
“Significant effort had been made to make these sites inaccessible and police were forced to scale very rugged terrain.
“It’s difficult to search and without the assistance of the police helicopter it would be almost impossible to locate these plants,” Inspector Best said.
The joint Cannabis Eradication Program (CEP) between New England police and the State Crime Command’s Drug Squad ended on Friday when the plants went up in flames.
Each plant was worth about $2000, but high quality cannabis can fetch up to $4000 per pound on the street.
The $9.7 million haul is the largest operation uncovered in the region for some time.
A $1.5 million setup was unearthed earlier this year in Basket Swamp National Park, 15 kilometres north of Tenterfield.
Close to 400 plants were seized and destroyed in that operation but Inspector Best said this latest discovery was a credit to dedicated police.
“It’s a testament of the hard work and dedication of the drug squad and local police who had to work in difficult terrain,” Inspector Best said.
“Searches for a number of days were hampered by deteriorating weather conditions and the searching time by the helicopter was significantly reduced.”
Only one man has been arrested so far and he has been ordered to front Glen Innes Local Court next year on charges of cultivating cannabis plants.
