A
photo taken by a resident in Hangzhou shows an unidentified flying
object hovering over Hangzhou, capital of East China's Zhejiang
province, late Wednesday, July 7, 2010. [Photo/Metro Express]
An
unidentified flying object (UFO) disrupted air traffic over Zhejiang's
provincial capital Hangzhou late on Wednesday, the municipal government
said on Thursday.
Xiaoshan Airport was closed after the UFO was
detected at around 9 pm, and some flights were rerouted to airports in
the cities of Ningbo and Wuxi , said an airport spokesman, who declined
to be named.
The airport had resumed operations, and more details
will be released after an investigation, he said.
A source with
knowledge of the matter, however, told China Daily on Thursday that
authorities had learned what the UFO was after an investigation.
But
it was not the proper time to publicly disclose the information because
there was a military connection, he said, adding that an official
explanation is expected to be given on Friday.
Inbound flights
were diverted to the nearby airports in Zhejiang province's Ningbo and
Jiangsu province's Wuxi. Outbound flights were delayed for three to four
hours.
A staff member at the airport's information desk said the
airport had "no idea" how many flights were affected by the closure.
At
around 11 pm on Wednesday, a netizen wrote three entries announcing the
airport's closure in
his microblog at Sina.com, but they were
all soon deleted.
He posted an apology at midnight, saying the
news had not been confirmed and asking those who had republished his
earlier entries to delete them.
