Drone Sightings Above Swedish Nuclear Power Plants Trigger Investigation

Sweden has been noticing strange sightings around its three nuclear power plants. And while sightings like these might not receive attention outside of the local press, the tensions with Russia across the Baltic Sea has made the situation particularly tense.

Following sightings of large drones flying above all three of Sweden’s nuclear power plants, Swedish police deployed patrols and helicopters to the Forsmark nuclear plant north of Stockholm to look for evidence of the drones. Unfortunately, the patrol came back empty-handed.

According to the Epoch Times, the sightings started a day after Sweden’s military started patrolling the main town on the Baltic Sea island of Gotland amid increased tensions between NATO and Russia. Russia recently deployed forces to the Baltic.

Swedish intelligence released a statement about the sightings.

“With regard to the cases of drone overflights at three nuclear power plants, the assessment is made that they are of such a nature that preliminary investigations have been taken over from the police authority in order to be able to investigate the incidents in more detail,” SAPO said in a statement.

In 2019, the Ringhals 2 reactor in southwestern Sweden was permanently shut down with operators citing a lack of profitability and rising maintenance costs. On top of that, there are two decommissioned nuclear power facilities in Sweden, Barseback, which sits on the narrow waterway between Sweden and Denmark, and Agesta, south of the Swedish capital of Stockholm.

Source: Bloomberg

Nothing is known about the drones, although experts initially suspected they might be there to spy on the Swedish plants. The Swedish press reported that the drones were big enough to withstand the wind.