For a few weeks, the residents of the small town of North Olmsted, Ohio, just outside of Cleveland could not use their key fobs to open their cars or garage doors. Now, the reason behind this mystery has been revealed.

It all started last month, when local resident Cory Branchick told reporters that when the problem first began, she assumed the battery in her key fob had died.

“So, I got a battery and that didn’t work,” Cory said. “It only happens when I’m only in the driveway. Anywhere else when I got to work or when I go to the grocery store, the key fob works.”

She went on to explain that ten of her neighbors were having the same issue, and residents who lived on other streets in the area were also experiencing the problem. Not only did they have their key fobs stop working, others also couldn’t operate their garage doors, while still some found both had stopped working.

Police investigated for weeks as rumors swirled about what was going on. One theory was that the airport was interfering with the device, while another was that NASA might be involved.

North Olmsted City Councilman Chris Glassburn thought from the beginning that something specific must be interfering with the fobs’ radio frequencies and he suggested that maybe the utility companies’ equipment in the area was responsible. AT&T and First Energy investigated and turned off the residents’ power, but the problem still persisted.

“We really thought it was going to be the utilities,” Glassburn said, adding that he would continue to investigate.

Finally, he teamed up with a retired communications employee to find the source using a de-amplifier, which allowed them to find the signal when they entered one of the residents’ homes. It was then that they found a homemade device had been causing the interference.

“It was a man-made custom device that was designed to notify the resident someone was in their home,” Glassburn said. “We turned it off and went outside pressed our clickers and everything started working again. It was like magic.”

He added that the resident who made the device had special needs and had no idea it was causing the problem.

“It was putting out a signal continuously and only was the signal interrupted would it tell them another individual was in the part of the home,” Glassburn said.

Thank goodness this mystery has now been solved! Find out more about this in the video below.