The mysterious monolith that appeared recently in southern Nevada - is now gone after being taken down by Las Vegas authorities on Thursday. 

Las Vegas Metro says it helped remove the shiny object "due to public safety and environmental concerns."

It's now being stored at an undisclosed location "while public authorities determine the most appropriate way to dispose/store the item."

The object, 77" tall with each face 13" wide, is made out of reflective sheet metal folded into a triangle. It's secured with rebar and concrete.

"It remains unknown how the item got to its location or who might be responsible. At this time, there is no LVMPD investigation into the object or the circumstances surrounding its existence."

Las Vegas police said on the social platform X that members of its search and rescue unit found the otherworldly object over the weekend near Gass Peak, part of the vast Desert National Wildlife Refuge where bighorn sheep and desert tortoises can be found roaming. At 6,937 feet (2,114 meters), it is among the highest peaks in the area north of Las Vegas.

“We see a lot of weird things when people go hiking like not being prepared for the weather, not bringing enough water," the police department wrote. “But check this out!"

The object is the latest in a series of mysterious shiny columns popping up around the globe since at least 2020.

In November of that year, a similar metal monolith was found deep in the Mars-like landscape of Utah's red-rock desert. Then came sightings in Romania, central California and on the famed Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas.

All of them disappeared as quickly as they popped up.

The Utah structure, which captured the world's imagination during the pandemic, is believed to be the first in the series. It stood at about 12 feet (3.6 meters) and had been embedded in the rock in an area so remote that officials didn't immediately reveal its location for fear of people getting lost or stranded while trying to find it.

Hordes of curious tourists still managed to find it, and along the way flattened plants with their cars and left behind human waste in the bathroom-free backcountry. Two men known for extreme sports in Utah’s sweeping outdoor landscapes say it was that kind of damage that made them step in late at night and tear it down.

The Utah and Nevada structures were illegally installed on federal land.

(The Associated Press contributed to this report.)