MIAMI -- The U.S. Coast Guard seized more than 75,000 pounds (34,000 kilograms) of illegal drugs this summer from boats far out to sea in the Pacific and Caribbean, which the service called its largest-ever haul worth nearly half a billion dollars.

A US Coast Guard cutter on Monday unloaded a record haul of illegal drugs in Florida that, if it had made it to the streets, could yield 23 million deadly doses of cocaine, the service said.

The U.S. Coast Guard offloaded 76,140 pounds of illicit narcotics on Monday, the largest single illegal drug dump in Coast Guard history.