United States fighter jets have shot down a total of four aerial objects over American and Canadian airspace since initial reports of a suspected Chinese spy balloon emerged nearly two weeks ago.
That balloon, which China has claimed was a weather aircraft, was shot down on Feb. 4 off the U.S. east coast — two days after American officials first acknowledged it and a week after it first entered U.S. and Canadian airspace. In the eight days since that takedown, American jets have shot down three “unidentified objects” over Alaska, Yukon and Lake Huron near Ontario and Michigan.
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The additional objects — the origins of which are not yet clear — have put continental security forces on “heightened alert,” Gen. Glen VanHerck, head of NORAD and U.S. Northern Command, told reporters on Sunday.
While the Chinese balloon has been recovered and is being examined by American personnel, officials are still searching for the other three objects to determine what they were and where they’re from.
Here is what we know, and don’t know, so far.
What we know
After news of the suspected spy balloon emerged earlier this month, the U.S. military has been adjusting its radar to find flying objects — including balloons — that are smaller, slower and differently shaped than enemy aircraft and missiles that have long preoccupied the Pentagon.
“We have been more closely scrutinizing our airspace at these altitudes, including enhancing our radar, which may at least partly explain the increase,” Melissa Dalton, assistant defence secretary for U.S. homeland defence, said in an Associated Press story on Monday.
The recent takedowns of the three still-unidentified objects began on Friday when the United States shot down a “high-altitude” object as it flew over Alaska near the northern Canadian border.
National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby would not say at the time if the object was a balloon or what entity owned it. He said the object, about the size of a “small car,” was flying at 40,000 feet and posed a “reasonable threat” to civilian aircraft.
In this image provided by the U.S. Navy, sailors assigned to Assault Craft Unit (ACU) Four operate landing craft air cushions (LCAC) during recovery efforts of debris from a high altitude balloon in the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of Myrtle Beach, S.C., Feb. 8, 2023.
Ryan Seelbach/U.S. Navy via AP
On Saturday, Global News published an exclusive report at 3:36 p.m. Eastern that NORAD officials were monitoring additional objects that could be more spy balloons. Within minutes of publication, NORAD confirmed in a statement that it had “positively identified a high-altitude airborne object over Northern Canada.”
Canadian CF-18s and American F-22s were scrambled from nearby airbases, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a tweet he had ordered the “unidentified object that violated Canadian airspace” over Yukon to be shot down. An American F-22 jet downed the object.
National Defence Minister Anita Anand said on Saturday the object is “potentially similar to the one that was shot down to the one shot down off the coast of North Carolina, though smaller in size and cylindrical in nature.”
“To our knowledge, this is the first instance of NORAD downing an object in Canadian airspace, and the importance of this moment should not be underestimated. We detected this object together and we defeated this together,” she said.
The object was flying at approximately 40,000 feet and “posed a reasonable threat to the safety of civilian flight,” Anand added.
Finally, on Sunday, a U.S. fighter jet shot down an “unidentified object” over Lake Huron on orders from U.S. President Joe Biden.
The object was flying at approximately 20,000 feet in U.S. airspace over Lake Huron in the state of Michigan, the Pentagon said. It likely fell into Canadian waters, U.S. Air Force Gen. Glen VanHerck said on Sunday.
“Its path and altitude raised concerns, including that it could be a hazard to civil aviation. The location chosen for this shoot down afforded us the opportunity to avoid impact to people on the ground while improving chances for debris recovery. There are no indications of any civilians hurt or otherwise affected,” the Pentagon said in a readout.
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The object appeared to be octagonal in structure, with strings hanging off but no discernible payload, a U.S. official speaking on condition of anonymity told Reuters.
Recovery efforts are ongoing.
What we don’t know
There are still a lot of unanswered questions regarding the recent objects, and officials aren’t ruling anything out – including whether they belong to aliens.
“At this point, we continue to assess every threat or potential threat, unknown, that approaches North America with an attempt to identify it,” VanHerck said Sunday.
“We’re calling them objects, not balloons, for a reason.”
Anand similarly did not give a clear answer when asked by a Canadian reporter on Saturday about the origins of the object shot down over Yukon.
“Is there any indication that this object is not terrestrial, is not from this world?” a reporter from The Canadian Press asked.
“From all indications, this object is potentially similar to the one that was shot down off the coast of North Carolina, though smaller in size and cylindrical in nature,” Anand responded. “That is the information that we are working with right now. But with further analysis, we will know more and be able to provide you with more details.”
“Just to confirm, so it sounds like it potentially was another balloon?” the reporter asked again.
“I will refer to that the item as an object at this time,” Anand said. “I am a person that depends on facts and will not provide opinions until I can ground them in some sort of facts. So I’m going to wait for the reports that I will be getting relating to the analysis of the debris.”
The downing of the original suspected spy balloon on Feb. 4 has worsened Chinese relations with the United States and Canada. Its discovery prompted U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to cancel a trip to China many had hoped would put the brakes on the sharp decline in relations over Taiwan, trade, human rights and threatening Chinese actions in the disputed South China Sea.
China has said that balloon shot down by the United States was an unmanned airship made for meteorological research that had been blown off course.
It has accused the U.S. of overreacting by shooting it down and threatened to take unspecified action in response. It’s unclear where the three objects recently downed originated from.
China’s foreign ministry has said it had no information on the latest three flying objects shot down by the U.S.
An American official told a U.S. Senate committee last week that the balloon was part of a “broader suite of operations” that are underway by Beijing.
Jedidiah Royal, the U.S. assistant defence secretary for the Indo-Pacific, told a U.S. Senate Appropriations subcommittee Thursday that the military has “some very good guesses” about what intelligence China was seeking.
When pressed on what information the balloon was specifically trying to gather, Royal said U.S. officials “are learning more as we exploit the contents of the balloon and the payload itself.”
“We understand that this is part of a broader suite of operations that China is undertaking to try to get a better understanding of the U.S.,” Royal said.
His public comments came just hours after AP reported on Wednesday that China’s balloon was equipped to collect intelligence signals and was part of a huge, military-linked aerial spy program that targeted more than 40 countries.
Similar balloons have floated over five continents, according to the Biden administration. China admitted last Monday that a balloon travelling over Latin America was also theirs.
— with files from Global News’ Mercedes Stephenson and Reuters