US Jets shoot down object flying at 40,000 feet over Alaska. The White House announced on Friday that a US fighter jet shot down an unidentified object drifting high over Alaska, just six days after the downing of an alleged Chinese surveillance balloon triggered a new diplomatic split with Beijing.
According to White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby, the purpose or origin of the new item is unknown, but it was removed because it posed a threat to civil aviation while floating at 40,000 feet.
“The president ordered the military to down the object,” Kirby said.
Questioned about the incident by reporters at the White House, Biden said the shoot-down “was a success.”
Kirby said the object was much smaller than a huge Chinese balloon that crossed the United States last week and was shot down by a US fighter jet off the Atlantic coast on Saturday.
It was “roughly the size of a small car,” he said.
“We do not know who owns it, whether state-owned or corporate-owned,” he said. “We don’t understand the full purpose.”
US Jets shoot down object flying at 40,000 feet over Alaska. Pentagon spokesman Brigadier General Pat Ryder said an F-22 Raptor used an AIM-9X missile to bring down the object — the same aircraft and munition used to target the alleged Chinese spy balloon.
The incident took place amid a new alarm over what US officials say is an ongoing program by China to fly surveillance balloons to collect intelligence around the world.
US officials said such balloons have flown over 40 countries, including at least four times previously over United States territory.
The Chinese balloon last week sparked particular concern as it overflew areas where the United States keeps nuclear missiles in underground silos and bases strategic bombers.
The event prompted US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to abandon a long-planned trip to Beijing aimed at boosting communications between the two antagonistic nations.
The new item was discovered late Thursday and shot down Friday afternoon, according to Kirby.
It crashed in northern Alaska near the Canadian border and landed over a frozen body of water, making recovery possible, according to Kirby.
‘Reasonable threat’
“We do expect to be able to recover the debris,” he said.
Biden ordered the shoot-down because at the altitude it was flying, Kirby said, the object posed “a reasonable threat” to civil aviation.
Kirby said the US military sent a plane to observe the object before it was taken down and “the pilot’s assessment was that this was not manned.”
The Chinese surveillance balloon had clear abilities to propel and maneuver itself, he noted.
It “was clearly for intelligence surveillance and inconsistent with the equipment onboard weather balloons,” a senior State Department official said Thursday.
“It had multiple antennas to include an array likely capable of collecting and geo-locating communications,” the official.
The official also tied the balloon to China’s People’s Liberation Army, without saying directly that it had been deployed by the PLA.
The Pentagon’s Ryder said the US recovery teams have finished mapping the debris field from the downed Chinese balloon and “are in the process of searching for and identifying debris on the ocean floor.”
“Debris that’s been recovered so far is being loaded on the vessels, taken ashore, cataloged, and then moved onwards to labs for subsequent analysis,” he added.
Beijing has rejected US allegations that it sent the balloon to spy on the United States, and said it had simply drifted by accident into US airspace.
But since Saturday China has rejected an overture by US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to speak by phone about the issue.
“The US insisted on using force to attack the airship, which seriously violated international practice and sets a bad precedent,” the Chinese defense ministry said in a statement.
