A military-grade aerial drone has been discovered washed ashore on a beach on the Black Sea Coast of Türkiye, Ihlas News Agency (IHA) has reported.

The UAV was spotted by local residents in the Filyos district of Zonguldak province, who called emergency services, the agency said in an article on Sunday.

The area was swiftly cordoned off by police, and bomb disposal experts were deployed over concerns that the drone could be carrying explosives, it added.

The initial assessment suggested that it was a military UAV, but a more thorough technical examination will be required to determine its country of origin, according to IHA.

The Turkish authorities haven’t yet commented on the discovery of the UAV, which is the second in less than a week.

On Wednesday, a drone carrying 5kg of explosives went down in northeastern Trabzon province, IHA reported. Investigators determined that the aircraft was of Ukrainian origin, the agency said, adding that local residents experienced a brief panic before the crash site was secured.

There were at least three UAV incidents in the country last month. In late June, a fixed-wing drone hit the ground in Türkiye’s Kastamonu province, while another one was found in Samsun province. Just over a week before that, a drone crash-landed on a beach in Bartin province.

In late March, the Turkish government said that they are closely monitoring the risks posed by drones in the Black Sea. According to Ankara, it maintains “contact with the relevant parties to prevent the war from spreading… and to prevent further escalation.”

Kiev has ramped up its long-range UAV attacks on energy infrastructure and civilian targets inside Russia amid continued setbacks on the battlefield in recent months.

There have been a number of incidents of explosive-laden drones, flying towards Russia’s northwestern Leningrad Region, crashing in NATO member states – Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Finland.

Russian Security Council Secretary Sergey Shoigu has warned previously that if it turns out that the Baltic states and Finland “deliberately provide their airspace” to Ukrainian UAVs, Moscow has the right to self-defense in response to an “armed attack” under Article 51 of the UN Charter.