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23rd February 2023
11:14am GMT
The mystery around a metal giant sphere that washed up on a shore in Japan may have been solved.
The orb, roughly 5ft (1.5m) in diameter, washed up on Enshu beach in the Pacific coastal city of Hamamatsu this week, forcing beachgoers to evacuate.
Authorities were left perplexed by what the object was or where it was from.
X-ray exams confirmed that the object was safe, but revealed little else. https://twitter.com/NHKWORLD_News/status/1628008229832720384?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1628008229832720384%7Ctwgr%5E98f6b6d615ef2e09816406f091c9fb9181c45c06%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theguardian.com%2Fworld%2F2023%2Ffeb%2F22%2Fmysterious-metal-iron-ball-sphere-beach-japan-officials-investigate Some locals dubbed it "Godzilla egg", with others wondering if it came from outer space. But it seems that the truth is much more mundane than this, and it is probably just a piece of maritime equipment, according to the Mail. The giant sphere looks very similar in size and shape to the steel buoys made by Chinese shipbuilding company Nantong Yangfan, used to guide mariners or mark positions in the ocean. The company is based in eastern China, meaning it is not unreasonable to suggest the buoy simply broke away and floated across the ocean towards Japan. [caption id="attachment_379211" align="alignnone" width="852"]
Could this be what the mysterious sphere is?[/caption]
Nervousness over the object's origin was particularly intense following events earlier this month involving three unidentified objects in US airspace.
The American government shot down a flying balloon, that some had suspected may have been a Chinese surveillance balloon.
China has claimed it was merely a weather-monitoring airship that had blown off course, and the White House has since said there is no indication any of the flying objects were linked to alleged Chinese spying.
But this was followed by Japan expressing concern to China on Wednesday about suspected surveillance balloons in its air space.
Japan claimed to have spotted suspected surveillance balloons over its skies at least three times since 2019, the BBC reports.
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