Radiation levels have spiked in New York City, fueling conspiracy theories that the drones terrorizing the Northeast are searching for a missing nuclear warhead.
The emissions, clocked by GQ Electronics' Geiger Counter World Map, were detected near the Bronx and Upper West Side Wednesday.
The application shows a radiation reading of 1048 counts-per-minute (CPM), i.e. how many particles were detected, in the Bronx: higher than normal background radiation.
The average person is typically exposed to background radiation that measures around five to 60 CPM, though CPM varies with sensor devices, according to NASA.
And, on the the Upper West Side, the app's reading measured a still high 175 CPM.
Now, an attorney and long-time critic of China claims that the spikes are a clue that the northeast's mystery drones might be a secret US government effort to identify 'an implanted nuclear weapon' hidden somewhere in the city by America's enemies.
'This is not something which is just wild speculation,' that lawyer and author, Gordon G. Chang, told reporters Monday.
'For more than a decade,' Chang explained, 'US officials have been worried about the North Koreans taking apart a [nuclear] device, smuggling the parts into the United States and reassembling it in the location of their choice.'
A publicly accessible tool - GQ Electronics' Geiger Counter World Map - uncovered two spots in New York City that saw a spike in radioactive particle emissions (in counts-per-minute) this week. Some linked the radiation events to the region's wave of mystery drone sightings.
'When you talk about radiation, clearly this could be one of the things that the drones are doing,' Chang told Forbes Newsroom, 'and that would explain why they're over residential areas because the device could be planted in one of those places'
Citizens, law enforcement and government officials have all put forward theories as to who or what is behind this recent wave of drone reports -- from mass hysteria to foreign espionage, to space aliens, to the testing of an top secret military aircraft.
While Chang's account echoes rumors that New Jersey's mystery drones were US government aircraft equipped with High-Purity Germanium (HPGe) radiation detectors on the hunt for a nuclear bomb, the story has faced serious criticism.
For starters, it runs counter to the official stance issues jointly by the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, the FAA and the Pentagon who all claim that the drones 'do not' currently present 'a national security or public safety risk.'
Some former Pentagon officials and military vets have also reported that their own current sources within the government have denied these 'nuke hunt' claims.
'They assured me that's not the case,' Navy veteran and former fighter pilot Lt Ryan Graves told podcaster Joe Rogan in a recent episode.'
'There is not a "loose nuke" or any other type of weapon of mass destruction that these objects -- whatever they are -- are pursuing right now,' Lt Graves stated.
The Navy vet told Rogan that his sources were part of the team that would normally leap into action to deal with an imminent nuclear threat to the domestic United States, adding that swarms of aerial drone technology would be a poor system for the job.
Some former Pentagon officials and military vets - including former senior Pentagon security official Chris Mellon and retired US Navy Lt Ryan Graves - have reported that their own current sources within the government have denied these 'nuke hunt' claims
'Having hundreds of drones trying to identify these isn't necessarily the best way,' Lt Graves explained. 'Gamma radiation is typically well-shielded in weapons.'
'And, at high altitudes -- or even moderate altitudes, like we are seeing these drones -- it would be pretty difficult to detect them [gamma rays],' he continued, echoing comments by nuclear emergency experts with the Department of Energy.'
'The Department of Energy/National Nuclear Security Administration's Nuclear Emergency Support Team does not employ drones for nuclear/radiological detection missions,' a department spokesperson told ABC News.'
DOE's Nuclear Emergency Support Team, the spokesperson added, 'is not currently conducting any aerial operations in that region.'
Former senior Pentagon security official Chris Mellon, no stranger to stories of mysterious UFOs in the sky, corroborated these claims, posting to X.com, 'My own discussions with federal officials track with this as well.'
The FBI and other agencies are investigating the alleged drones, but a representative from the Department of Homeland Security said Wednesday, Dec. 11: 'We have no more information as to where these drones are coming from, where they're launching from, where they're landing'
'At this point we really need the president of the United States to actually address the American people,' an attorney and long-time critic of China, Gordon Chang (above), told the business publication Forbes. 'Tell us what the federal government knows and what it doesn't know'
Stories linking the still as-yet-unexplained drone sightings to loose radioactive material gained an injection of interest this Tuesday, when Belleville Mayor Michael Melham went public with news of a very real, damaged shipment of a medical device.
'There is an alert that's out right now that radioactive material in New Jersey has gone missing on December 2nd,' Mayor Melham told Fox 5 New York. 'There was a shipment. It arrived at its destination. The container was damaged, and it was empty.'
But the damaged device, which had been shipped from the Nazha Cancer Center in Newfield, New Jersey, was declared to be a 'non-emergency' by authorities.
The 'Event Notification Report' issued by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Operations Center on December 13, 2024 found that the device was 'very unlikely to cause permanent injury to individuals.'
The medical device in question, an Eckert & Ziegler model HEGL-0132, only contains trace amounts of the radioactive isotope Germanium-68.
But, regardless of the purpose of the drones, Chang emphasized to Forbes that the US government's vague assurances of safety were insufficient, a point also echoed by Mellon, Lt Graves and others.
'At this point we really need the president of the United States to actually address the American people,' Chang told the business publication, 'and tell us what the federal government knows and what it doesn't know.'