19,000 cannabis plants destroyed in record Vancouver Island operation
Police destroyed 19,000 mature cannabis plants at about 350 sites across Vancouver Island in a nine-day air-and-land operation ending 29 August 2007, beating the previous year's record of 16,500. Two people found tending a crop near Campbell River were arrested, with charges pending.
🇨🇦 Vancouver Island, British Columbia · British Columbia, Canada
Arrested
2
Plants destroyed
19,000
Police destroyed 19,000 mature cannabis plants at about 350 sites across
Vancouver Island in a nine-day air-and-land operation that ended on Wednesday
29 August 2007.[1]RCMP Corporal Greg Cox said most of the plants were found
in the northern part of the island, with concentrations north of Campbell River
and around Sayward; some sites held a few hundred plants and others a few
thousand.[1]Officers from the RCMP and the Victoria and Saanich municipal
police flew with Canadian military Sea King helicopters to reach remote plots,
pulling in an average of 2,000 plants a day.[1][2]
The haul beat the previous year’s record of 16,500 plants.[2]Cox said
police believed the crop was destined for island streets and possibly beyond,
with profits flowing to organised crime groups.[2]
One arrest incident was reported near Campbell River, where two people were
found tending a crop and charges were pending.[1]A second account describes
the same incident as two arrests.[3]
The articles give no separate finish date; 29 August 2007 is the Wednesday on which the nine-day operation ended according to the 4 September account.
One account frames the Campbell River incident as a single arrest involving two people, while another describes two arrests; both agree two people were found tending the crop.
Accounts differ on the haul's yield in joints and those estimates are not used here.
No photograph of the 2007 operation with a recoverable direct image address was found in the opened sources.
Ontario's cannabis enforcement team searched properties in Stone Mills and Madoc on 7 October, seizing 1,072 plants, processed cannabis and a stolen vehicle worth over $1.8 million. No one was at either site; power was cut over fire and electrical hazards and inquiries continue.
Four southwestern Ontario police services with the Canadian Armed Forces seized and destroyed close to 2,700 outdoor cannabis plants between 19 and 21 August 2013 in Project O-SABOT, the Ontario arm of the national Operation SABOT.
Five police services with military support seized and destroyed about 4,700 outdoor marijuana plants across southwestern Ontario between 14 and 18 September 2009. Police valued the haul at close to 4.7 million dollars and reported no arrests from the five-day operation.
Police seized 51,031 outdoor marijuana plants and 207 kilograms of bulk buds during Project Sabot, a one-month crackdown across the National Capital Region that ended 27 September 2007. Aerial patrols found the plots; the RCMP announced the results on 5 October.