The large mystery object that washed up on a remote Western Australian beach two weeks ago has finally been identified.

The cylindrical bronze-coloured object was the subject of much curiosity when it was found near Green Head, about 250 kilometres north of Perth in mid-July.

Beachgoers were initially asked to steer clear of the barnacle-encrusted and rusty piece of metal, as multiple state and federal agencies were called in to help work out what it was, and where it had come from.

After it was declared no risk to the community, the object was taken by front-end loader to be stashed securely while experts tried to establish its origin.

On Monday, the Australian Space Agency said it had solved the mystery.

“We have concluded the object located on a beach near Jurien Bay in Western Australia is most likely debris from an expended third-stage of a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV),” it wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

“The PSLV is a medium-lift launch vehicle operated by the Indian Space Research Organisation.”

Tweet from @AusSpaceAgency

The ASA said it would continue to store the 2½-metre tall space junk while it worked with Indian authorities to decide what to do with it, “including considering obligations under the United Nations space treaties”.

Monday’s announcement confirmed what many experts had suspected – that the object belonged to Indian space exploration.

In mid-July European Space Agency engineer Andrea Boyd told the ABC that experts believed the item fell from an Indian rocket launching a satellite and could be 20 years old.

“We’re pretty sure based on the shape and the size, it is an upper-stage engine from an Indian rocket that’s used for a lot of different missions,” she told the ABC.

“[India] has been using them since the 1990s and they’ve launched more than 50 missions.

“Based on the amount of barnacles, it’s probably not the one from this year.

“But at the same time, when it gets thrown around the ocean it does tend to look older than it would normally.”

Some users of social media site Reddit speculated the object could be Indian space junk from an LVM3-M4 rocket.

WA police initially declared the device as hazardous and urged the public to stay away. They later said it was safe.