Border & Immigration

U.S. and Mexican Authorities Searching for Cross-Border Tunnel

By Amy Isackson / Border Reporter

Published June 29, 2009 at 5:44 PM PDT

This story was published more than 15 years ago.

Law enforcement officials on both sides of the San Diego-Tijuana border are searching for a tunnel that may run beneath the border fence.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman Lauren Mack says the search began around 4:30 p.m. Monday. She says it is a joint investigation with ICE agents and the Mexican Army working together.

Mack says a tip sent authorities into action, though she would not specify if the information came from someone in the U.S. or Mexico.

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She says ICE agents will work until dark to find an exit on the U.S. side. Then, they’ll secure the area and begin again in the morning.

She says agents could bring in a back hoe to try to dig up the tunnel, if they can’t find the exit searching above ground.

Authorities have unearthed more than 100 tunnels along the U.S. Mexico border since the 1990s. The vast majority were rudimentary passageways.

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Border & Immigration Tijuana

Amy Isackson

Amy Isackson was the border reporter at KPBS from 2004 to 2011. She covered breaking news and feature stories on California-Mexico border issues and immigration, for local and national broadcast. Amy got her start in public radio by pitching a series of stories about rural New Zealand - horse dentistry and sheep sheering - to Radio New Zealand's "Country Life" program. She then worked with Peabody Award-winning radio producers Nikki Silva and Davia Nelson, to help create the Sonic Memorial, a series of stories on the World Trade Center before, during and after 9/11. Amy's work has been recognized with awards from the Associated Press Television-Radio Association of California and Nevada, the California Chicano News Media Association, and the San Diego Press Club. She won the Sol Price Prize for Responsible Journalism in 2009 from the Society of Professional Journalists for her story about high school students smuggling people and drugs across the U.S.-Mexico border. Prior to venturing into the wonderful world of public radio, Amy worked for Yahoo! Inc. for nearly five years as an editorial surfer, associate producer and broadcast communications manager. She majored in Latin American History at Williams College. She grew up in San Diego and made frequent trips south of the border.

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