Toronto airport: $15 million in gold and other valuables stolen at Pearson International Airport, police say

(CNN) An air cargo container containing more than $15 million in gold and other valuables disappeared from Toronto’s Pearson International Airport on Monday, and police are still trying to determine who is behind the high-value heist.

The aircraft was unloaded and the cargo taken to a storage facility early Monday evening, “as per normal procedure,” Stephen Duivesteyn of Peel Regional Police said at a news conference Thursday at the airport.

Then, “this high-value container was removed by illegal means from the storage facility,” he said.

Police will not say whether security cameras captured the robbery, which airline carried the container or who owns the container.

“What I can say is that the container contained a high-value shipment, it contained gold but was not exclusive to gold and contained other items of monetary value,” Duivesteyn said, estimating the contents to be worth around $15 million ($20 million in Canada). dollars).

Police would not speculate on whether this was a “professional” job, saying it was too early in the investigation.

“We’re three days in, so our investigators have their eyes open to all avenues. So we don’t want to make a mistake and kind of focus on one particular area, we kind of take a broad view of it, so we’re looking all angles on how this item was stolen,” Duivesteyn said.

The container was described as 5 or 6 square meters in size.

“I would suggest that this is an isolated incident. This is very rare,” Duivesteyn said, adding that the investigation is not expected to disrupt any operations at the airport, which claims to be Canada’s busiest.