Report: US military confirms ‘high altitude flying’ shooting down

John Kirby, the National Security Council’s coordinator for strategic communications, announced that the US military had shot down a “high-altitude object” within US airspace over Alaska in the past 24 hours.

“So I can confirm that the Department of Defense was tracking a high-altitude object over Alaska’s airspace within the last 24 hours,” Kirby said. “The object was flying at an altitude of 40,000 feet and posed a reasonable threat to the safety of civil aviation. Due to the Pentagon’s recommendation out of an abundance of caution, President Biden ordered the military to take down the object.”

According to Kirby, the Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon (UAP) did not violate US territorial waters, but actually originated “from within our territorial waters”. He added that it was incredibly doubtful since “those waters are now frozen.”

Asked by a member of the press if it was possibly another Chinese spy balloon, Kirby said the UAP was “much smaller” than previous Chinese spy balloons and “closer to the size of a small car”. He also said it does not carry “significant payload”.

John Kirby: “I can confirm that the Department of Defense has been monitoring a high altitude object over the airspace of Alaska within the last 24 hours… [The object] posed a reasonable threat to the safety of civilian flight … the fighter aircraft assigned to … shot down the object” pic.twitter.com/mnhVbOyZFQ

— Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) February 10, 2023

Related: China Balloons – A Layered Scandal

Administration under pressure

The UAP’s downing comes at a time when the Biden White House is already under scrutiny after a recent Chinese spy balloon traveled across the country for a week until it was shot down over the Atlantic Ocean over North Carolina. Traveling across the country without interruption.

Although the Chinese government said the balloon was, according to PostMillennium, “a civilian weather vessel” that “accidentally” entered US airspace, the Pentagon confirmed that the balloon was actually gathering information as part of a Chinese intelligence gathering program. Government that the United States has apparently known for years.

John Kirby said the object that was brought down in the last hour of its flight over Alaska’s airspace was “much smaller” than the Chinese spy balloon, roughly “the size of a small car”. pic.twitter.com/n3qEuJbyYs

— Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) February 10, 2023

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in its response to the balloon that “the Chinese side has clearly asked the US side to handle the matter properly in a calm, professional and restrained manner. Under these circumstances, the use of US force is a clear overreaction and a serious violation of international practice.”

The spy balloon was described as “the size of three school buses” and flew at about 60,000 feet in the air, so not the same size or height as the UAP dropped over Alaska.

At this point, the Pentagon has not released further details about the nation of origin, whether it has been unnamed, or any other information that was not initially reported by Kirby.

According to a report by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence in early January, there have been more than 350 UAP reports from within the United States since March 2021 that the Pentagon was aware of.