U.S. sailors recover a high-altitude surveillance balloon off the coast of Myrtle Beach, S.C., on Feb. 5 after an F-22 fighter jet downed the Chinese surveillance device.U.S. Navy via AP
There is one thing the White House would like you to know about the unidentified flying objects shot down over the U.S. and Canada this past weekend: they probably weren’t sent by aliens. “There is no, again, no indication of aliens or extra-terrestrial activity with these recent takedowns,” press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre emphatically told a briefing this week.
Other than that, the two countries’ governments have given little indication of what exactly they blasted out of the sky.
Also unclear is why this is happening now. NORAD, the joint U.S.-Canada air defence system, has been operating since 1958, when it was set up to intercept hypothetical Soviet attacks via the Arctic, but had never been used to shoot anything down until this month.
There are, however, a few theories. It may be a new, stepped-up espionage effort by China, Russia or another U.S. adversary. Or it may be a function of increased vigilance by air force commanders.
There is also the possibility that the objects were innocuous, and political pressure over President Joe Biden’s reluctance to immediately take down a Chinese spy balloon earlier this month made the commander-in-chief more eager to pull the trigger subsequently.
Here is what we know, and what might be going on.
Where unidentified high-altitude objects have been shot down
GREENLAND
Feb. 10
Offshore near
Deadhorse, Alaska
Feb. 11
Yukon territory
CANADA
Feb. 12
Lake Huron
U.S.
Feb. 4
Offshore near
Myrtle Beach,
South Carolina
MEXICO
Size of suspected Chinese surveillance balloon that was shot down on Feb. 4
THE BALLOON
STATUE OF LIBERTY
60 m
93 m
MURAT YÜKSELIR / THE GLOBE AND MAIL, SOURCE:
GRAPHIC NEWS
Where unidentified high-altitude objects have been shot down
GREENLAND
Feb. 10
Offshore near
Deadhorse, Alaska
Feb. 11
Yukon territory
CANADA
Feb. 12
Lake Huron
U.S.
Feb. 4
Offshore near
Myrtle Beach,
South Carolina
MEXICO
Size of suspected Chinese surveillance balloon that was shot down on Feb. 4
THE BALLOON
STATUE OF LIBERTY
60 m
93 m
MURAT YÜKSELIR / THE GLOBE AND MAIL, SOURCE:
GRAPHIC NEWS
Where unidentified high-altitude objects have been shot down
ICELAND
RUSSIA
GREENLAND
Feb. 10
Offshore near
Deadhorse, Alaska
Feb. 11
Yukon territory
CANADA
Feb. 12
Lake Huron
U.S.
Feb. 4
Offshore near
Myrtle Beach,
South Carolina
MEXICO
CUBA
Size of suspected Chinese surveillance balloon that was shot down on Feb. 4
THE BALLOON
STATUE OF LIBERTY
60 m
93 m
MURAT YÜKSELIR / THE GLOBE AND MAIL, SOURCE: GRAPHIC NEWS
Catch me up. What’s happened?
Sometime on or before Jan. 31, Canadian fighter jets began tracking a Chinese spy balloon over the Rocky Mountains. Mr. Biden said it was too dangerous to shoot it down over land, for fear of killing or injuring someone on the ground, so the U.S. waited until it drifted off the South Carolina coast to fell it with a missile.
The U.S. and Canada have not explained why NORAD didn’t shoot the balloon down before it reached populated areas – whether it was a deliberate decision in order to study the aircraft, or whether they simply didn’t detect it until it was too late. Either way, Mr. Biden has taken some heat from his Republican political opponents, who argue the balloon should not have been allowed to keep going so long.
Then last Friday, Saturday and Sunday, U.S. fighter jets shot down unidentified objects over the Arctic Ocean off the coast of Alaska, the central Yukon wilderness and the waters of Lake Huron. Canadian warplanes were involved in the pursuit of the second object, with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau authorizing the shoot-down.
Both governments say they don’t know what these last three objects were or who sent them.
What could explain all of this?
The first possibility is that one or more of the three unknown objects was, like the earlier Chinese balloon, part of an espionage effort. It could be that China – or, possibly, Russia or another country – has recently been stepping up its efforts to spy on the U.S. and Canada.
Mr. Trudeau appeared to allude to this during a fortuitously timed visit to Whitehorse this week. “Obviously there is some sort of pattern in there — the fact we are seeing this in a significant degree over the past week is a cause for interest and close attention,” the Prime Minister said.
The second major theory is that these sorts of objects, whatever they are, have been flying around for a while but the U.S. and Canadian militaries simply didn’t previously detect them because they weren’t really looking. The Pentagon has given credence to this possibility. In a briefing Sunday, NORAD commander General Glen VanHerck said that the system’s radars are usually set to filter out slow-moving objects, presumably to focus on more obvious potential threats, such as planes or missiles. After the detection of the Chinese spy balloon, NORAD readjusted the radars and started picking up the aircraft Mr. Biden and Mr. Trudeau subsequently ordered taken down.
“We’ve been able to get a better categorization of radar tracks now. And that’s why I think you’re seeing these overall. Plus, there’s a heightened alert to look for this information,” General VanHerck told reporters.
Relatedly, it could be that the things downed over the weekend are civilian aircraft whose owners simply failed to report them to the authorities.
John Kirby, the spokesman for Mr. Biden’s security council, said it was possible the objects were being used for non-nefarious purposes such as scientific research. But he said they had to be shot down because NORAD couldn’t rule out the possibility they were being used for espionage. They also could have drifted into the path of a plane. “Because we have not yet been able to definitively assess what these most recent objects are, we acted out of an abundance of caution to protect…our security, our interests, and flight safety,” he said.
NORAD commander General Glen VanHerck, middle, arrives for a closed-door briefing on the Chinese balloon with U.S. senators in Washington on Feb. 9.Drew Angerer/Getty Images
What do we know about the UFOs?
The three craft shot down last weekend appeared to be different from the Chinese spy balloon, U.S. officials have said.
For one, they were smaller – each about the size of a small car, by comparison to the balloon, whose payload was as large as two or three city buses. They were also flying at lower altitude, between 6,000 and 12,000 metres, in the same range as most commercial air traffic. The previous balloon was far higher, at more than 18,000 metres.
Unlike the spy balloon, the three UFOs also did not appear to have any sort of system for steering, meaning the more recent craft were simply being blown around by air currents. There is also no evidence that they were able to transmit signals. All four of the aircraft shot down were unmanned.
Some of the most important questions, however, are still unanswered.
For one, U.S. officials won’t even say whether these aircraft were balloons or something else, referring to them instead as “objects.” The Canadian military has been somewhat more forthcoming, describing both the craft shot down over Yukon and the one that plunged into Lake Huron as balloons.
It’s also not clear who owned the objects or what they were doing. Mr. Kirby has repeatedly said the government does not yet know.
Why don’t we know more? When might we?
Searchers are still trying to recover the wreckage from the three aircraft. One came down on Arctic sea ice, another in remote boreal forest and the third in the middle of a Great Lake, all of which pose varying levels of difficulty.
The RCMP, which is leading the search for the craft in Yukon, has been blunt about the needle-in-a-haystack effort: they may never be able to find it.
“It is unfortunately very rugged and mountainous terrain. There’s a very high level of snowpack in the region,” Sean McGillis, an RCMP official said. “So our efforts are going to be difficult, they will be challenging, they will take us some time.”
But surely they at least know whether these things are balloons or not?
You would think so. Several U.S. and Canadian air force pilots have flown close enough to observe and describe the mystery aircraft. Warplanes also often have cameras mounted on them. But officials have dodged when asked about this. It’s not clear why.
In one memo from the Pentagon to U.S. lawmakers that was leaked to CNN, the Department of Defence described the object shot over Yukon as a “small, metallic balloon” with a payload hanging from it.
The suspected Chinese spy balloon drifts toward the ocean after being shot down off South Carolina on Feb. 5.Randall Hill/Reuters
Can we go back to that earlier spy balloon for a minute? Are we living in some sort of steampunk dystopia?
Yes, apparently. According to Mr. Kirby, China has been running a “high-altitude balloon program for intelligence collection” for several years. These airships have crossed over dozens of countries. The program dates back at least to the administration of former U.S. president Donald Trump, Mr. Kirby said, but was undetected until recently, when Mr. Biden ordered an assessment of Chinese intelligence capabilities.
So far, the U.S. says the balloons have not been very useful to China compared to other means of surveillance (e.g., spy satellites) but could improve if left unchecked. China, meanwhile, has accused the U.S. of running a Victorian-inspired spy program of its own.
“We are not flying surveillance balloons over China,” Mr. Kirby said. “I’m not aware of any other craft that we’re flying…into Chinese airspace.”
Relax, E.T.: The White House does not suspect you in the balloon mystery.
Okay, but are we sure this isn’t aliens?
Asked about this Sunday, General VanHerck made the mistake of not directly answering the question. “I haven’t ruled out anything,” he said.
After the internet exploded with variations of “high-ranking general won’t rule out aliens” posts, the White House decided to proactively pour cold water on the speculation.
At the start of Mr. Kirby’s White House briefing, Ms. Jean-Pierre repeatedly made clear there is nothing to suggest extra-terrestrials sent craft across the galaxy, only to see them felled by a species that has never travelled farther than the moon.
“I know there have been questions and concerns about this,” she said. “I loved E.T., the movie. But I’m just going to leave it there.”