By Tim Binnall
Japanese authorities are attempting to determine the nature and origin of a sizeable metal sphere that mysteriously washed up on the beach. The presence of the 'unidentified once-floating object' reportedly came to light earlier this week when a woman stumbled upon it as she walked along the shore of the coastal city of Hamamatsu. She promptly reported the metal ball, which measures approximately five feet in diameter, to police, and they isolated the odd object out of initial concerns that it could be some kind of explosive. While the peculiar sphere was found to be hollow and harmless, what exactly it is and where it could have come from are questions which have left officials in Japan scratching their heads.
Despite what was largely good-natured speculation on social media in Japan, the possibility that the sphere could be connected to aliens can be put to rest by the fact at it sports a pair of handles which suggest that it served some purpose here on Earth. Theories that the ball might somehow be related to clandestine Chinese spying have also been dismissed and, as of now, the most prevalent explanation for the object is that it is a mooring buoy that wound up breaking loose from a ship and drifted over to Hamamatsu. That said, this remains only a hypothesis as the Japanese government continues to examine the sphere in the hopes of finding a definitive answer to the mysteries surrounding it.