An oil tanker named the Torm Agnes entered the Port of Ensenada on the afternoon of March 8, on Mexico’s Pacific coast, carrying nearly 120,000 barrels of diesel.
Such a vessel was rare in that area, which primarily handles cruise ships, luxury yachts, and container ships. Ensenada lacks the infrastructure to safely unload flammable hydrocarbons, making it even more unusual.
Waves of trucks arrived at the dock to take much of the Torm Agnes’s cargo.
Workers rushed to fill the vehicles’ tanks, up to six at a time, using hoses extending from a larger one attached to the vessel. The operation, although risky, was carried out with precision, according to an eyewitness and a photo and video of the incident shared with Reuters.
“They had a team, they were very meticulous in what they had to do, and very fast,” the person said.
“They worked nonstop, even at night.”
The audacious maneuver was the work of cartel-linked smugglers, according to three Mexican security sources and three people familiar with the operation.
This, they say, is part of a wave of smugglers revolutionizing Mexico’s fuel market with a flood of low-priced fuel obtained mainly from the United States and disguised in customs declarations as something else.
The Mexican criminals did not act alone. A Houston company called Ikon Midstream played a key role in the multi-million-dollar Ensenada operation, Reuters discovered.
It bought the diesel in Canada—documentation indicates it was lubricants—and chartered the vessel to deliver it to a client who Mexican authorities say is a front for one of the country’s largest and most violent cartels.
Ikon Midstream and its chief executive, Rhett Kenagy, did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Attorney Joseph O. Slovacek, who represents the company and Kenagy, told Reuters in an October 18 email to stop contacting its clients.
“No one will talk to your reporter!” Slovacek said.
The Port of Ensenada did not respond to a request for comment. Denmark-based Torm, which operates one of the world’s largest tanker fleets, including the Torm Agnes, said it stopped operating with Ikon Midstream a few weeks after the Ensenada incident.
