Acting on a tip-off, a unit of troops from the Army’s drug suppression centre at That Phanom staked out the Mekong River bank in Ban Kham Phak Praew in Tambon Nam Kam. At 8.20PM they spotted a boat from Laos approaching before almost a dozen men began unloading bags from the boat onto the river bank. The troops then emerged from hiding but the smugglers fled into the darkness, leaving the bags behind.
Soldiers examining the bags found 480 one-kilo bars of compressed, dried marijuana inside.