Two tonnes of cocaine, valued at €157 million, have been seized from the MV Matthew. But what do we know about this 190-metre-long, 32-metre-wide ship involved in the State's largest-ever seizure?
Before reaching Irish waters, the Panama-flagged MV Matthew undertook a five-week journey, where it spent time off the Guyana coast, changed its name, and underwent a safety inspection.
Company registration documents show Matthew Maritime Inc, the company that owns MV Matthew, was set up in July this year with an address listed in the Marshall Islands.
"Prior to that, the MV Matthew just was a standard bulk carrier ship. Nothing too unusual about it, but obviously it seems to have been purchased specifically for this operation," said maritime open-source researcher Joe Galvin.
Ownership
Documents show that Matthew Maritime Inc bought the bulk carrier ship on 10 August. The vessel had been renamed nine days prior, matching the company details, as MV Matthew.
Matthew Maritime Inc is a 'one-ship' company, meaning the vessel is the company's only asset.
"It's something that you see commonly in ships that are basically up to no good. It's kind of a recognised phenomenon. A lot of US vessel arrests, they've spoken about how common it is for a one-ship company to be the suspects in the case," said Mr Galvin.
The specific Marshall Islands shelf-company address provided by the company has also been used previously by US-sanctioned shipping companies, Mr Galvin added.
The Marshall Islands company registration process requires company owners to declare minimal details, meaning it is almost impossible for researchers to determine who is the true owner of the company.
Journey to Cork
The MV Matthew’s journey to Ireland began on 19 August, departing from Curaçao, a Dutch-Carribean island roughly 30km north of Venezuela.
In the two weeks prior, it had been officially renamed the MV Matthew while en route from Brazil to Aruba. Data from ship tracking and maritime analytics provider Marinetraffic.com show it set up at anchorage off Aruba on 7 August and then left for Curaçao on 9 August, arriving seven hours later.
MV Matthew stayed in the port of Willemstad in Curaçao for nine days. While it was there, on 12 August, it underwent a safety survey and was issued with a safety management certificate.
It then left Curaçao for Cork on 19 August.
The bulk carrier sailed southeast along the coast of Venezuela, before spending two weeks seemingly at anchor off the coast of Guyana in South America. Its location data shows it remaining static for 16 days from 22 August until 7 September. It then sets off across the Atlantic.
This period is the most interesting part of MV Matthew's journey, Mr Galvin believes, although, it's difficult to ascertain what the ship was doing during that time as that particular stretch of water is extremely busy.
Mr Galvin said there were over 500 encounters between ships in that area over that period.
"It [MV Matthew] may have been engaging in a ship-to-ship transfer, where cargo from one ship was offloaded and loaded onto the MV Matthew. It may have been picking up crew. It's hard to say, but that's a very, very busy stretch of water where ship-to-ship transfers happened quite commonly," Mr Galvin said.
MV Matthew then travelled steadily northeast across the Atlantic Ocean before spending a day off the Canary Islands.
MV Matthew then continued north up the coast of Portugal and into the Celtic Sea.
It was in Irish waters from at least 23 September. An Garda Síochána said the Joint Task Force, which eventually intercepted and boarded the ship, was set up on 22 September, based on international intelligence.
On 23 September, while in the Celtic Sea, and having provided near-constant location signals every 10 or 20 minutes to other ships and tracking satellites, its location data goes blank between 14.10 and 17.55. This appears to be the longest absence of tracking data in its journey - a similar absence occurred in the Bay of Biscay, off France.
Continuing on its journey, it makes its way northeast past Waterford on Saturday evening and up as far as Arklow before changing course completely and turning back southwards on Sunday night.
Around midnight on Sunday into Monday it slowed significantly for several hours before returning to its prior speed. By Monday morning at 6AM it was in St George's Channel between Rosslare and Wales. It spent Monday night into Tuesday morning static off Waterford.
Gardaí said MV Matthew was attempting to flee when the Naval Service closed in on it off the county Cork coast on Tuesday.
The MV Matthew arrived at Cork Port on Tuesday night, 38 days after it left Willemstad port in Curaçao.
A smaller trawler, allegedly connected with the MV Matthew, that ran aground off Wexford on Sunday night, is still off-shore on Wednesday.
Marine trackers show no recent information on this trawler – its last-recorded signal was in November 2022 in Castletown-Bearhaven.
