"It's a good thing. Like I said, it was definitely a needle in a haystack that was found and I think people in Western Australia will be able to sleep better tonight," said to the press Steve Dawson, minister of emergency services of this Australian state.
The Anglo-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto had apologized on Monday for the loss.
Authorities drove hundreds of miles of freeway in search of the tiny capsule.
She was eventually discovered by the side of a deserted road just south of the town of Newman, near the mine from which she had been transported, said state emergency services official Darren Klemm. .
After six days of research, one of the mobilized vehicles detected radiation while traveling on the highway.
Authorities are now working to recover the capsule safely before taking it to a safe location, Klemm said.
The silver-colored capsule, which measures 8 mm by 6 mm, used during mining operations, according to the authorities, contains a radioactive substance, Cesium-137, capable of causing acute irradiation.
It had been lost during its transport by truck between a mine near the remote town of Newman and the northern suburbs of Perth (south-west), a distance of approximately 1,400 kilometers.
© 2023 AFP