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CHINESE BALLOON SENSORS RECOVERED FROM OCEAN, SAYS US

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1 hour ago

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Media caption,

No indication of aliens... I loved ET but I'll leave it there - WH spokeswoman

By Max Matza
BBC News


The sensors from the first suspected Chinese spy balloon shot down over the US
have been recovered from the Atlantic Ocean, the US military says.

Search crews found "significant debris from the site, including all of the
priority sensor and electronics pieces identified", said US Northern Command.

The FBI is examining the items, which the US says were used to spy on sensitive
military sites.

The US has shot down three more objects since the first one on 4 February.

"Large sections of the structure" were also recovered on Monday off the coast of
South Carolina, military officials say.

About 30-40ft (9-12m) of the balloon's antennas are among the items found,
according to CBS, the BBC's US partner.



US officials said the high-altitude balloon originated in China and was used for
surveillance, but China said it was merely a weather-monitoring airship that had
blown astray.



Since that first incident, American fighter jets have shot down three more
high-altitude objects - over Alaska, Canada's Yukon territory, and Lake Huron on
the US-Canada border.

In the Lake Huron strike, the first Sidewinder missile fired by the US F-16
warplane missed its target and exploded in an unknown location, US media
reported, citing military sources.

The second missile hit the target. Each Sidewinder missile costs over $400,000
(£330,000).

 * Strange flying objects - unanswered questions
 * UK ready to defend against spy balloons - Sunak

Officials have said the slow-moving unidentified objects, all of which have been
smaller than the first balloon, may be difficult for military pilots to target.

White House spokesman John Kirby said on Monday the three other objects were
shot down "out of an abundance of caution".



They did not pose "any direct threat to people on the ground", but were
destroyed "to protect our security, our interests and flight safety", he said.

The balloon shot down over South Carolina was described by officials as the size
of three buses. 

The second object, over Alaska, was described as the size of a "small car". The
third object, over the Yukon, was "cylindrical". And the fourth, over Michigan,
was said to be "octagonal" with strings attached. 

A Pentagon memo later reported in US media said the flying object shot down over
Yukon appeared to be a "small, metallic balloon with a tethered payload below
it".

Defence officials also wrote in the memo that the object shot down in Michigan
"subsequently slowly descended" into the water after impact.

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Watch: 'What’s going on?' The mind-boggling balloon mystery in 61 seconds

The recovery of the balloon shot down on 4 February was delayed amid foul
weather.



Efforts are under way to collect debris from where the other objects were blown
out of the sky.

Canada's federal police force said on Monday that the search area in the Yukon
Territory was about 3,000 sq km (1,870 sq miles), including "rugged mountain
terrain with a very high level of snowpack".

Royal Canadian Mounted Police spokesman Sean McGillis said there was a
possibility the fragments from the Yukon and Lake Huron incidents might never be
recovered because of their remote locations.

Image source, US Navy
Image caption,
Navy divers helped recover the balloon from the Atlantic Ocean

Canadian Armed Forces Major-General Paul Prévost said all three of the most
recent objects to be shot down appeared to be "lighter than air" machines, and
described the Lake Huron object as "a suspected balloon".

The military chief added that any members of the public who discovered debris
should contact the police directly.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken is considering meeting China's most senior
diplomat, Wang Yi, later this week at a security conference in Munich, Germany,
sources familiar with the negotiations told US media on Monday.

Amid the row over high-altitude aircraft, America's top diplomat cancelled a
visit to Beijing that was initially planned for last week.




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RELATED TOPICS

 * Spying
 * China
 * United States
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