INQUISITR.COM / News & Politics

Radioactive Drone Discovered Atop Japanese Prime Minister’s Office

By Dustin Wicksell
Published on: 02:46 PST, Apr 22, 2015

A drone containing a minute amount of radioactive material was found atop the roof of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s office on Wednesday morning, local media has reported.

The drone was discovered by a member of the Prime Minister’s staff, according to CNN, who then alerted authorities to its presence. The discovery occurred around 10:20 a.m., and a bomb squad was called to the scene to examine the drone, which was a quadcopter measuring approximately 1.7 feet across, according to NBC News. The drone was carrying a camera and a water bottle, which contained a small amount of cesium, a radioactive material. Authorities related, however, that the amount found was harmless to the human body.

Government spokesman Yoshihide Suga said that police would be investigating the origin of the drone, as he contended that the incident may lead the Japanese government to regulate aerial drones.

“This situation concerns the center of Japanese government, the prime minister’s office, and we will take every necessary step, including a detailed investigation by police,” he said.

Prime Minister Abe wasn’t in his office when the radioactive drone was discovered, as he was attending an Asia-Africa summit in Indonesia. While it remains unclear who sent the drone to the Prime Minister’s office and for what purpose, the New York Post reports that a Japanese court recently approved the restart of a nuclear power station in the country’s southwestern region, a cause of concern for many in the wake of the Fukashima disaster of 2011.

Japanese authorities related that they began studying the issue of drones as a security risk after one of the devices crashed on the White House lawn in January of this year. As the Inquisitr previously reported, President Obama wasn’t in the executive mansion at the time, having traveled to India. More recently, news that the Secret Service would be employing drones in the airspace over Washington led to fears among some that the devices could be used either for illegal surveillance or weaponized, carrying ordinance aloft over the nation’s capital. Neither of those concerns, however, have so far proved valid.

Japanese authorities are continuing to investigate the origin of the radioactive drone, which also carried two smoke flares.

[Image: Tsuyoshi Veda/ Kyodo News via Twitter]

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