The three objects strongly suggest that Chinese surveillance balloons confirmed in Japan's airspace since November 2019 were near important infrastructure such as a nuclear power plant and Self-Defense Forces facilities.
The Defense Ministry has strengthened its monitoring of the airspace as a result of this.
Satsuma-Sendai is located in Kagoshima Prefecture, facing the East China Sea. On November 20, 2019, an employee of the Sendai Space Museum captured images of an object through a telescope. A resident told the museum that a possible UFO was flying over the city.
The museum's employees saw the object in the sky moving from west to east. The setting sun was reflecting off the object at the time. When the object was viewed through a telescope, a white sphere could be seen with what appeared to be a linear item attached to the bottom of the sphere.
The city is home to important facilities such as the Sendai nuclear power plant of Kyushu Electric Power Co. and the Ground Self-Defense Force Camp Sendai. The municipal government was alerted to the floating object, and its employees visually confirmed it.
A whitish floating object was also spotted in Miyagi Prefecture at around 8 a.m. on June 17, 2020. According to a senior official of the Miyagi prefectural government, the white object had two propellers and was at an altitude of more than 3,000 meters.
The object passed east over the southern part of the prefecture and disappeared into the sea shortly after 3: 30 p.m. Air Self-Defense Force facilities are located in the prefecture.
A flying object was confirmed in Hachinohe, Aomori Prefecture, over a year later, on September 3, 2021, where a Maritime Self-Defense Force base is located.
Masahiro Iwamura, now 67, spotted the white object in the southwest sky at about 5 a.m. that day, when he was taking photos of the sunrise near a beach.
He said he saw something hanging from the sphere when observing the object through a camera lens.
The Defense Ministry said Tuesday it is vigilance and surveillance and that it is doing all possible vigilance and surveillance.