They took out the balloon with a missile. If they wanted to recover it couldn't they have taken it out with guns? Or is that an impossible target?

btw lots of theories, conspiracy theories on social media about this but has anyone considered it might actually be a weather balloon?

I hope the US govt sends the PRC the bill for clearing up Chinese trash!

I spent 28 years as an airline jock flying into and over China on a regular basis. Observations:

Convoluted air routes to avoid their military bases (not that you could see much as the country is 99% smog).

Sometimes threatening or actually having to declare an emergency in order to get clearance to deviate to avoid thunderstorms.

Narrow, crowded corridors for civvies to fly in with the military controlling the rest of their airspace.

A general impression of a paranoid regime.

My point? I can imagine the squealing from the ChiComms if a huge American ‘weather balloon’ ever overflew their neck of the woods.

Chinese spy balloon over US
 

No doubt there will be lots of wailing from the Chinese about bringing it down. Remember China shot down a Cathay Pacific airliner over the sea near Hainan Island in 1954.

However...

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...istration.html

It's started.

Why not, The city of Esperance, Western Australia, sent NASA a fine for littering when Skylab broke up there. Some reports say the fine was payed by NASA, others by a DJ who raised funds from listeners. I suspect it was all dtreated in a more light-hearted spirit than this event will be.

Uneducated question but if the payload module was very large, could it hold a small crew?

IG

Sad...
 

But experience has led me to distrust most anything the Pentagon says, or more precisely, what the news media say/says that the Pentagon said.

Reminds me of how Thomas Jefferson wrote in various letters at various times, that in his day, the news media of that time, newspapers, pamphlets and public speeches, were on one day the best defense for a democracy and on the next day, the worst enemy.

Some times some things seldom change.

But it's US that broke this in the first place. Invoice incoming for property damage?

In either case (assuming that hitting it with a gun was feasible), it might well only have been the envelope that was damaged - at least until it hit the sea ...


Where's the fun in that ? :O

Shoot it down earlier?
 

those who popped up and said how "empty" Alaska was, obviously do not live there nor have family living there.

With lawyers ready to jump out from behind every tree, I thought it quite sensible to wait until it was past the coast before it was shot down.

Sod's law is alive and thriving.

Regarding the comparison to the regret of the radar observers at Pearl Harbor, I suspect the technology and its applications are a tad more developed and advanced than then. On the other hand, there is an ongoing undercurrent of suspicion that "they" knew exactly what was happening and let it happen due to the rules of democracy which limited the actions of that current US government.

Then again, many documents are still kept out of public view.

The one thing I'm relatively confident of, is that there is more that our government does not tell us and actively misleads us about than what they are honest about.

Hopefully everyone will reveal more evidence it was actually a spy balloon than they did with WMD in Iraq few years ago.

Thank you Gums - always appreciate your contribution.
You were flying fast jets before I was born!

If it did carry any equipment of a sensitive nature would it not have some self destruct mechanism? or have I watched too much fifties American TV?

Looks like Yemen, Japan and India have had similar visits in recent years.

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The good thing is it will be much more intact than if they had shot it down over land. Which might be -besides collateral damage- the reason they waited for it to be over sea. They shot it down close to shore so I'm sure they want to have a closer look at it. Chances are there will be not much to see, though. It was surely clear to the Chinese that it would be shot down and retrieved.

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....0de0b1a31.jpeg

Just shows how many military sites there are in the US.

I'm waiting for it to be reported that it narrowly missed a school. At least the finale provides plenty of opportunity for news editors to use their favourites, "plunged" and "plummeted".