Boozin’ Blog

Estonian police have arrested a ruthless gang of vodka smugglers. The cabal of Russian and Estonian criminals was sneaking hundreds of gallons of vodka across the border from Russia to Estonia via an underwater pipe.

My first thought when I saw this story was how good could it be after going through those pipes? I can’t find any details about the quality of the plumping but almost any possibility that I can come up with leaves me wanting to rinse out my mouth. Were they old, forgotten pipes that once had a legitimate use? If so can you image the filth that the vodka would have picked up? OK, maybe they were new. A PVC pipeline would have been glued together giving the already bad brew a glue-ee taste. What about metal? There we have the possibility of lead from any joints that had to be joined together.

Turns out that it was as bad or even worse than I imagined. The homebrewed booze was made in Russia then piped over to Estonia to be sold on the black market. But the stuff was so bad that they had trouble selling it! Even tax-free and in an economy that supports an estimated 20% black-market booze this vodka was so bad that the criminal masterminds had to trundle the stuff from town to town looking for buyers.

This was how they got caught. On one of these trips with their truck loaded down with bootleg vodka and looking for buyers that the cops pulled them over. And thus began the investigation that lead to a 2 kilometer long pipeline laid at the bottom of a firewater reservoir on the border.

I guess my point is that if you ever decide to go on a bender in Estonia always ask to see the tax stamp on whatever you’re drinking. Bleah!

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