Operation Jardena: How ABF is stopping fentanyl coming to Australia

It’s the one thing that keeps Border Force awake at night — this is the drug criminals are cashing in on around the globe.

Picture: AFP via NCA NewsWire

Authorities are on high alert to prevent a repeat of America’s fentanyl crisis unfolding on our shores, with the Australian Border Force’s US officer admitting it keeps her awake at night.

The opioid – which is 50 times stronger than heroin – is the leading killer of Americans aged 18 to 45 and has fuelled an alarming rise in homelessness and street crime across the US.

The latest Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission wastewater drug monitoring program report, released last month, showed fentanyl use had remained “relatively stable over the past two years” and was at “historically low levels nationally”.

But law enforcement agencies were shocked in August to discover a bid to ship 11kg of the synthetic drug – the equivalent of more than five million potentially lethal doses – from Canada to Melbourne.

The San Pedro Port in California, where the Border Force inspect for illegal contraband. Picture: Supplied

Border Force inspector Vanessa Ruff, who is based in Los Angeles, said the Australian Federal Police and the ACIC were “doing an exceptional job trying to stay on top of it”.

“The social effect keeps me awake at night if it was to get into Australia, because I’ve seen how it’s affected this nation,” she said.

“We are very aware of it … and we really don’t want it.”

About 70,000 Americans died from a fentanyl overdose in 2021 – a higher toll than gun crime, Covid and suicide – and the figures for last year are tipped to be even worse.

“Fentanyl is the single deadliest drug threat our nation has ever encountered,” US Drug Enforcement Agency boss Anne Milgram said.

Last week, US officials revealed a sweeping fentanyl bust that charged the four sons of notorious Mexican drug lord El Chapo, as well as suppliers in China who sold the precursor chemicals used to manufacture the opioid.

It’s the job Australian Border Force inspector and Operation Jardena supply chain liaison officer, Vanessa Ruff, to detect illegal contraband. Picture: Supplied

In a series of extraordinary indictments, the Sinaloa cartel was accused of using everything from private planes to submarines to import fentanyl into the US from Mexico, and of torturing their enemies including by feeding them to tigers.

Ovidio Guzman’s arrest in Mexico by police and the army. Picture: Supplied

But some Republicans including former president Donald Trump have demanded the Biden administration go further by designating the cartel as a terrorist organisation and even launching military strikes against them in Mexico.

Ms Ruff said US authorities were also identifying the emergence of other synthetic opioids.

“Touch wood, we haven’t seen a lot of the synthetic fentanyl, but there’s other stuff I’ve learnt while I’m here that’s worse than fentanyl that’s being mixed with drugs here, and we don’t want that,” she said.

“Every time you go to a meeting, they’re like, this is ten times worse than fentanyl.”

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Originally published as Operation Jardena: How ABF is stopping fentanyl coming to Australia