The illegal cannabis farm is so huge that it was visible from space

By Maureen Meehan

Okay, we know that NASA’s international space station and other such spaceships can take in a lot of what is happening here on the third planet from the sun, but an indoor cannabis farm?

Last week, Nevada authorities, along with an impressive surge in national law enforcement, raided what they called the largest illegal marijuana cultivation in Douglas County’s history and perhaps one of the largest ever discovered in the state, legalizing adult use Cannabis in 2017.

Photo by Olena Ruban / Getty Images

With 80 workers, the cannabis farm was also the largest employer in the area, competing with several smaller firms in Douglas County, which is 20 miles south of Nevada’s capital Carson City and borders Lake Tahoe.

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The numbers associated with growing 160 greenhouse pots on 22 hectares of land were “staggering,” reported the Record-Courier.

What did the authorities do with the 62 tons of weed when they found it?

They buried it on the website, “… hopefully deep enough to keep others from digging it up,” the newspaper said.

“They weren’t small plants either. People who worked on site in harsh conditions that would not survive in any regulated business tended the facilities for months. The residents began to report the location for the first time last summer (2020), even when the last embers of the fire number went cold. “

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The Numbers Fire was wildfire that burned nearly 19,000 acres and damaged over 1,000 homes in Nevada’s Pine Nut Mountains in July 2020.

Why did it take the authorities so long to ransack the website?

The Record-Courier said law enforcement agencies may have been waiting to uncover the source of funding, hoping to blow up a sophisticated criminal enterprise and then track down the kingpins.

Photo by Eric Kayne / Stringer / Getty Images

When the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office, the DEA, Homeland Security Investigations, Bureau of Indian Affairs, the FBI, the Nevada Division of Investigation of the Washoe Tribal Police Department, and several other local law enforcement agencies finally raided the cannabis greenhouses, they took about 80 Individuals for questioning on the sheriff’s website. But only two were arrested – one for violating immigration and one for possession of a controlled substance that was not marijuana.

It seems, at least for now, the authorities’ chances of tracking down the cannabis king pins may have been buried with the 62 tons of weed.

This article originally appeared on Benzinga and was republished with permission.