A jet ski rider has scooped up a block of cocaine floating in the ocean.
Daily Mail Australia has learned the video was shot in Sydney’s Bondi in early January.
Images showed the man taking a brown-covered ‘stone’ from a storage compartment. The word Zoe is written on the package.
“So I’ve just been in the heads and I just found this little package. It looks like cocaine,” he said.
“So we’re about to hand that over to the police.
“Probably $100,00, $200,000 dollars in that little package over there, just around the corner from Bondi. So Zoe, you’re going to miss your Christmas present.’
The strange find is not an isolated one.
Up to 213kg of cocaine has been discovered between Sydney and Newcastle since December 22, including 90kg in the New Year.
A jet ski rider scooped up a block of cocaine floating in the ocean (pictured)
Footage showed the man picking up a brown ‘brick’ with a sticker reading ‘Zoe’ on the packaging from a storage compartment
The NSW State Crime Command has employed a marine expert to determine how long the tightly wrapped packages have been floating in the ocean.
Detectives hope this will shed light on the consignment the drugs belong to, with stamps on the cocaine providing crucial clues that gangs may be involved.
The first barnacle-covered package, weighing about 80 pounds (39 kg), was discovered on Magenta Beach, on the state’s central coast.
In the 48 hours that followed, six more packages containing a total of 46kg of cocaine were discovered on the beaches between Sydney and Newcastle.
Another 39 blocks of cocaine were found by a fisherman at Barrenjoey Headland, in Sydney’s northern beaches, on Boxing Day.
That same day, a further 39kg was found in the Newcastle Ocean Baths.
A package containing a kilo of cocaine was subsequently discovered by a lifeguard about 1km off the coast of North Bondi on New Year’s Day.
The NSW State Crime Command has taken over the investigation into who the packages were intended for and why they washed ashore.
Police are trying to link the stones to known imports, with stamps on the packages providing an important clue to the gangs to which the shipment belongs.
One of the cocaine-coated barnacles that have washed up on Australia’s east coast since December 22
Up to 213kg of cocaine has been discovered between Sydney and Newcastle since December 22, with 90kg of the drug found over the New Year (see photo of some cocaine packages)
Citizens have been urged not to treat the wave of discoveries as a ‘treasure hunt’, warning that anyone caught with one of the mysterious packages will be accused of being in possession of a ‘large commercial quantity’ drugs.
“If someone is caught in possession of one of these stones, it is a large commercial quantity and carries a life sentence of 25 years, so it is a significant sentence,” said Jason Weinstein, director of the NSW Police State Crime Command, earlier this month.
“We don’t know yet what the purity of that is, we don’t know what’s mixed with that, there’s a whole bunch of unknowns.”
Anyone who comes across an object that they suspect contains cocaine is urged not to touch or open it, but to contact the police.
While some tightly packed stones have washed ashore unscathed, others have been destroyed by salt water seeping through the packaging.
The investigation into how the cocaine ended up on Australian shores continues with theories including the packages being thrown from a cargo ship or driven from an anchor by ex-Cyclone Jasper.