Discovery on the beach

A passerby reported an object resembling a drone on the beach at Karwia in Pomerania on Tuesday, 13 October, with the call reaching Puck county police around 18:20 according to most reports. Officers secured the site and alerted the Military Gendarmerie, the prosecutor's office, bomb disposal specialists, the army, the Internal Security Agency and the Military Counterintelligence Service. Counter-terrorism police were also sent to the scene, and firefighters from Puck county were present only to light the area. The object is about two metres long and was partly buried in sand. Authorities judged that nearby residents did not need to be evacuated and set a safety zone of 300 metres around the find.

Safety checks

Lieutenant Colonel Dariusz Rozkosz, spokesman for the commandant of the Military Gendarmerie, said on the morning of 14 October that chemical, radiological and explosives threats had been eliminated. Tests for biological materials were still under way at that point. He said the investigation team would move in to inspect, recover and secure the object for further study once those hazards were cleared, and that there would be no risk to human health if all the threats were ruled out. Asked whether the find could be confirmed as a drone, he gave this answer:

If we meant a drone with four propellers, then no, but if we treat the fuselage with wings as a drone, then probably yes.

Whose drone was it?

RMF FM journalist Krzysztof Zasada reported that the fragments belong to a Polish test drone from the Military Aviation Technology Institute (Instytut Techniki Wojsk Lotniczych), which had taken part in exercises before it came down. Rzeczpospolita reports that the Ministry of National Defence told RMF 24 the fragments came from a test drone. The Gendarmerie and other services had not confirmed the claim when the reports were published, but they did not rule it out either. Rozkosz said the object was partly covered in sand, so a closer inspection would have to wait until the security work was finished. If the object carries identification markings, they could help establish where it came from.

Prosecutors and next steps

Mariusz Duszyński, spokesman for the Gdańsk Regional Prosecutor's Office, said a prosecutor was at the scene around 21:00 on 13 October, when the Gendarmerie began securing the area under the prosecutor's supervision. Work was paused overnight, and on 14 October further prosecutors from the 8th Military Department of the Gdańsk office joined the team. A decision on opening an investigation will be taken once the procedural steps on the beach are complete. Rozkosz promised updates as soon as the site could be approached safely:

As soon as we are sure it is safe to approach the object, we will certainly inform you.