There’s now more information on that object that the military shot down over Alaskan waters, which we reported on earlier.
It was a “high-altitude object,” flying at about 40,000 feet that was about the size of a “small car,” according to National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby.
The description of the object was unusual.
ABC News Chief Global Affairs Correspondent Martha Raddatz first reported that when fighters were scrambled, the pilots did visuals, got images, and said there was no sign the object had propulsion.
It was described as “cylindrical and silver-ish gray” and seemed to be floating, a U.S. official said.
Asked if was “balloon-like,” the official said, “All I say is that it wasn’t ‘flying’ with any sort of propulsion, so if that is ‘balloon-like’ well — we just don’t have enough at this point.”
Sounds more UFO-ish, if they can’t even identify what it is. But at least this time they were able to detect it.
They first detected it on Thursday evening. It was picked up by ground radar, and they flew planes up to check it out.
But they didn’t shoot it down until Friday afternoon around 1:45–after they had more planes check it out and after they got the order from Joe Biden. They shot it down over frozen water, so they believe they will be able to recover it. They said they shot it down because it could pose a danger to civilian air traffic.
PENTAGON: “High-altitude object” shot down over Alaska is “not similar in size or shape” to Chinese spy balloon pic.twitter.com/yXq5tw0r6p
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) February 10, 2023
KIRBY: "We're calling this an object because that's the best description we have right now. We do not know who owns it. […] We don’t know if it’s state-owned. We don’t understand the full purpose."pic.twitter.com/fubWFiHtI7
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) February 10, 2023
A reporter asked if they could derive some “policy” from this, to which Kirby gave an unintentional indictment of the Biden team.
.@NewsNation's @BlakeBurman: "Is the policy still considering the 1st one was shot…off the east coast & this…was shot…off the west coast, is the policy…you can shoot it down if it is over…water?
Kirby: "I wouldn't derive from these 2 incidents some sort of policy" pic.twitter.com/72MK5SUtVg
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) February 10, 2023
“I wouldn’t derive from these 2 incidents some sort of policy,” Kirby said.
You can say that again; that’s the problem.
Some wondered why it wasn’t taken down Thursday.
So per the Pentagon, this new unidentified flying “object’ (Chinese balloon/drone?) was detected over Alaska last night but they needed POTUS authorization to shoot it down and that only happened today. Why the delay? Is it not possible to wake the president when he’s asleep?
— Miranda Devine (@mirandadevine) February 10, 2023
They said they told Biden Thursday, but he didn’t order it shot down until Friday. It’s not clear why it took that long.
Others noted that this is what should have been done with the Chinese spy balloon last week — shooting it down near Alaska.
So we can shoot down suspicious objects BEFORE they get over our border… Just as I suggested. https://t.co/eZcVmbMpDa
— Dr. Roger Marshall (@RogerMarshallMD) February 10, 2023
Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK) said in a statement, according to Fox, that we needed to send a message to China and others “to publicly reiterate that we will be shooting down any and all unknown aircraft that violate our airspace.” He said we “also need to appropriately equip our military in Alaska with the sensors and aircraft needed to detect and, if necessary, destroy everything from slow-moving balloons to hypersonic missiles. Alaska is the front line of defense for our nation. The past few weeks have made this even more evident.”
Hopefully, they learned something from this and will solve the “domain awareness gap” the NORAD Commander claimed they have had in detecting things. As Sullivan said, that’s essential to our national security, as well as to send the right message to China and anyone else that they can’t just breach our airspace.
Story cited here.