The mysterious object detected by a group of fishermen about nine nautical miles off sea and brought ashore on Thursday, is a sea glider used by National Aquatic Resources Research and Development Agency (NARA) for continuous long-term measurement of oceanographic factors, an official of the agency told the media on inquiry.
The sea glider is a deep-diving Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) designed for missions lasting many months and covering thousands of miles and various oceanographic researches. Experiment establishments worldwide use these implements for their underwater research work. NARA also makes use of these buoyant gadgets to examine and analyze the conditions of sea such as salinity, strength, direction of sea currents etc.
“We have informed fishermen about these AUVs and not to tamper with them but they are not mindful over our instructions,” the official said.
The fishermen who were onboard the fishing trawler ‘Thushan Putha’ brought the sea glider to the shore as they assumed it to be a part of an aircraft on Thursday.
However, the officials of NARA are planning to go to Galle to bring back the sea glider to the agency.
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