More than 168 tunnel attempts have been identified since the first cross-border tunnel was documented in Arizona on May 17, 1990. Tunnel discoveries have increased nationwide in recent years: 16 were discovered in fiscal year 2008; 27 more were found in fiscal year 2009; 13 were uncovered in fiscal year 2010; 18 in fiscal year 2011; 16 in fiscal year 2012; and seven tunnels were found in fiscal year 2013.
Illegal tunneling may be increasing because Mexican drug cartels are finding it much more difficult to use traditional methods to get drugs into the U.S. Since 2006, CBP has hired and trained 6,000 new Border Patrol agents, new border fencing has been constructed and the steel gates along the Nogales drainage systems have remained impassable.
“The smuggling organizations are very creative,” said Deputy Patrol Agent in Charge Kevin Hecht from Border Patrol’s Nogales Station. “Once they come upon significant resistance, like they did with the gates installed by Border Patrol, they don’t just give up. They try to find another way.
“It is our job,” Hecht said, “to stay on stop of them and prevent them from entering the U.S. illegally.”
Through May of 2014, 107 tunnels have been discovered in the Tucson Sector and 102 of them were in Nogales. Nogales is the most active illegal tunneling area in the U.S.