Mexico’s largest aircraft fleet does not operate an airline. The Sinaloa drug cartel owns significantly more planes. Even if it is confiscated again and again. Some time ago, the state seized 586 planes and 13 helicopters belonging to the largest Mexican drug cartel within ten years. In addition, he discovered more than 4729 secret airstrips. And that’s just what the authorities discovered.
It’s no wonder, then, that the arrest of one of the cartel’s key figures is anything but unobtrusive. Ovidio Guzmán, son of jailed drug lord Joaquín El Chapo Guzmán, was arrested in Culiacan on Thursday (January 5). And the passengers on board an Embraer E190 from Aeromexico noticed this in an unpleasant way.
“As we accelerated for takeoff, we heard shots very close to the plane and we all threw ourselves on the ground,” said a passenger on board flight AM165. Military jets had previously landed at the airport. Aeromexico’s Embraer E190 with the registration number XA-ALW was apparently hit by bullets while trying to arrest the drug lord.
Aeromexico has since said no one was injured on board the plane that was shot at. But the operation still has repercussions, because: Culiacán is the home of the Sinaloa drug cartel, one of the most powerful criminal organizations in the world. The arrest sparked riots. Culiacan Airport has since been closed. The government is asking citizens to stay at home.
The arrest came just days before US President Joe Biden was due to visit Mexico. Ovidio Guzmán, who became a key figure in the cartel after his father’s arrest in 2016, was arrested by security forces in October 2019 but was quickly released.
He has also been wanted by the US Drug Enforcement Agency since 2018 because they blame him for the country’s mass deaths from the drug fentanyl. Washington had offered a reward of up to $5 million for information leading to his arrest.
This article was written by Laura Frommberg
The original of this article “Plane wants to take off, suddenly it is shot at on the runway” comes from aeroTelegraph.
