South west Sydney is the meth production capital of NSW
It’s the 100km stretch dubbed “The Meth Belt” — the region favoured by drug cooks who are turning suburban homes into drug labs. INTERACTIVE: IS YOUR SUBURB ON THE LIST?
NSW
Don't miss out on the headlines from NSW. Followed categories will be added to My News.
- Ice addict shot dead trying to escape prison officers
- Confessions of an ice addict: ‘I’ll knife you for drugs’
- Meet NSW’s new Ice Commissioner
- The homes testing positive for meth
Hugging the fringes of suburban Sydney, it’s the 100km stretch dubbed “the meth belt”.
From Picton in the south west, to the Blue Mountains in the west and Richmond in the north, the semirural greater Sydney spread has been the location of choice for cooks driving the state’s boom in drug laboratories.
Ahead of the Special Commission of Inquiry into Ice, The Sunday Telegraph and The Daily Telegraph launch this four-part special investigation into the drug epidemic ravaging communities across NSW.
The rate of clandestine laboratories popping up around the state has skyrocketed, with police busts on the makeshift drug dens increasing by a staggering 46 per cent last financial year. Police say small operations run out of a residential kitchen have made way for an increase in larger-scale operations, where cooks use commercial equipment to produce hundreds of litres of drugs at a time.
NSW Drugs and Firearms Squad commander Detective Acting Superintendent Michael Cook said the swing towards these huge operations has pushed labs into semirural areas.
“A lot of the labs we see there are on small rural properties,” Supt Cook told The Sunday Telegraph.
“Camden, that seems to be very popular, because of it’s rural nature.
“We have a term we use, ‘The Meth Belt’, which goes from Picton/Camden up around Leppington/Bringelly, Cecil Hills, out towards Blue Mountains and Windsor.
“They just seem to pop up there all the time.”
Supt Cook said drug manufacturers were increasingly looking for isolated locations, like farms or sheds on semirural acreage, that trucks transporting equipment could come and go without looking out of place, alerting neighbours.
“When it was on a smaller scale we would see it in kitchens, bathrooms and laundries,” he said.
“But as the scale has increased and they need to make sure they are not as visible to neighbours. Some of these reaction vessels (vats) are as high as the ceiling and weigh a tonne.
“They will need trucks to bring them in and that would attract attention in a residential area.”
Data obtained by The Sunday Telegraph shows in the 15 months until April this year, police busted 86 labs across the state.
A large proportion of the work for the Chemical Operations Unit — a 24-hour response team within the drug squad that analyses and cleans up drug labs — has been focused in south west Sydney.
More than 30 labs were found in residential and rural areas on the city’s southwest fringes while 14 were located in the northern suburbs.
Last year, police uncovered a significant drug manufacturing operation run out of a unit in Strathfield. It only came to their attention after it exploded and once police went in they found 60kg of methamphetamine worth $30 million.
In another case in Mt Vernon in March, a stainless steel reaction vessel blew up and a man was left standing on the street with acid burns.
“The neighbours all came running up to the place, and saw him standing there — he must have been very close to the vessel when it blew,” Supt Cook said.
“He couldn’t hear anything, he had obviously blown his ear drums and he was in shorts and a singlet or T-shirt.
“He had acid sprayed all over his legs and he was bleeding from the legs.”
Supt Cook said there had been times when police forensic chemists, wearing breathing apparatus and protective clothing, had collapsed after becoming overwhelmed by fumes.
In comparison, the drug cooks are often found wearing shorts and thongs and using their own T-shirt as a makeshift mask.
At the end of last year, police uncovered an MDMA lab in Mt Hunter, near Camden, and found 21kg of MDMA, 13kg of precursors and 28 litres of GBH.
Pulling apart the labs is a dangerous process in itself and can take days.
Aside from the affect the drug labs have on those involved, they can make houses and properties permanently uninhabitable — even after a thorough clean — and leave other residents extremely ill as the chemicals saturate the walls.
Supt Cook said there had been examples where children living in the same house as a drug lab had as much methamphetamine in their hair samples as a regular ice user.
Police are now working closely with chemical suppliers, who are encouraged to report any suspicious buyers. Last financial year there were 84 labs found in NSW compared to 57 in the previous year.
Originally published as South west Sydney is the meth production capital of NSW
Vigils held one-year on from Hamas attack on Israel
An early morning vigil has been held at Bondi Beach on the anniversary of October 7 Hamas Terror attack in Israel. Members of the Jewish community, dignitaries, MPs and survivors were in attendance.
Read more
Fears October 7 anniversary could ignite unrest in Sydney
Fears of unrest in Sydney consume the first anniversary of Hamas’ terror attack, after pro-Palestinian protesters swarmed the CBD on Sunday, taking aim at state and federal politicians.
Read more