Chinese spy balloon

Or maybe it’s a valentines balloon gift from Fang Fang to you know who… ya, let’s go with that.

unbelievable silence from the DQ’s who were so vocal 2-6 years ago.

Why aren't you in jail with the rest of the insurrectionists?

If you could get past your hate, you’d be a pretty decent guy.

What a ass you are,

It can't do anything that satellites don't already do.

It can't do anything, now.

But the Chinese don't care, it already completed its mission. And they are popping the champagne corks and giving high fives all around mission control. Now they can go analyze all the data they collected. I'm not sure what they will do with it, but widely separated imaging sensors on that huge gantry is going to give them image intelligence far, far better than can be had with any low earth orbit (LEO) satellite. Think 3-D images over huge tracts of land. The dwell time of a balloon is several orders of magnitude longer than any LEO satellite. And dwell time is exceedingly important if you are collecting SIGINT. But the real purpose of this stunt is to see how Joe Biden would react, and I'm sure the Chinese Communist Party is VERY HAPPY.

Wouldn't they perhaps be happier to have evoked a tantrum?

No. When you understand what the long term goals are of Communist China, this is just a small part of that.

The Chinese have a 100 year plan.

Should be required reading for every elected official. It's very obvious to anyone who spends more than ten seconds thinking about how China acts and not what they say.

Donald Trump warned us more than 20 years ago. The link below is from NPR's Frontline.

Internet news story says it has hit the Atlantic, debris field is about 7 miles long.

It seems many aircraft CVR are able to elude discovery in oceans despite transmitting a signal, ‘Here I am, here I am, come get me’.

I’m guessing the payload is a dummy, the event simply intended to demonstrate capability as well as to test response.

Kinda scary.

What if the payload was a virus,dispersed at a low altitude on the way down?

Bird flu,swine flu,who knows?

A new super lethal human virus?

It passed over many non populated regions and there were many opportunities to down it then.

Maybe that is why they let it get over the ocean before bringing it down.

You make a lot of assumptions. And, laced with paranoia, they make no sense.

#14

Actually, America got there first

Anthrax bomb

A little paranoia is healthy,especially when dealing with such an adversary.

It was extremely stupid,IMHO, to let the balloon traverse the entire USA without interference.

No need to disintegrate the balloon,simply punch some holes in it and let it descend slowly,and then a simple retrieval.

So why didn't they do the logical things?

Why destroy it totally if they wanted to get info on what it was carrying?

The debris is scattered over a ten mile area now,making total recovery unlikely.

I am sure ground based telescopes had very high resolution images,even the amateur versions.

I am also pretty sure that all info gathered while floating around was sent back to the receiving station by satellite link.

If the balloon was steerable,that is a whole new can of worms.

How far do you think a foreign balloon would get if it entered Chinese air space?

We saw this thing coming when it entered our air space above Alaska;plenty of time to take it down.

"Something is rotten in Denmark",as the saying goes.

Before Lyn started attacking,… as I said, a lot of speculation going on…

You should have seen Lyn back in late in 2016 and on,… especially when he couldn’t defend his platform, he’d make stuff up by projecting his own paranoia et al onto others… and he still does…

one shouldn’t confuse paranoia with being prepared. But, yes, it could be construed as paranoia.

And you were there with me insults and all.

While I agree with you on most of your items, I have one question...

How do you "simply punch some holes in it" and maintain a controlled release of gas at 60,000 feet?

Seriously. I'm not trying to be hyperbolic or attacking you. I seriously want to know how this can be accomplished without a catastrophic release. I just can't get my brain around the physics of such an attempt.

I like your response…

I look at this exercise as brain storming exercise. It’s like a project manager looking at a problem with a simplistic answer, not knowing the technological challenges… without killing the topic, one doesn’t know where good ideas will come from.

Exactly. I think I know how to safely deflate a large weather type balloon while standing on the ground where the air pressure is relatively high.

I would attempt to puncture the skin with a self sealing valve which I could then meter the gas release.

But I can't see any reasonable scenario at 60,000 feet with the vast difference in relative pressure between the inside and outside of the balloon. The balloon skin is so taut up there that it would seem that any puncture would be like trying to slowly deflate a child's balloon with a pin.

I don't think it can be done but I'd like to hear other thoughts.

I had posted a video of the Canadian kids that bought a weather balloon, and as it got in the upper atmosphere, that ballon expanded in the thin air, until it ‘popped’.

this issue, I doubt if we were even prepared for it to capture it, but I’m thinking capture would be with a quick response team and capture it it like they have done back in the day…. With an airplane and a ‘sky hook’ type of thing/process. Like they used to catch film from a spy satellite/balloon’s???

it’s more of a challenge…

Well, the Chicom balloon has pluses and minuses relative to the old Skyhook program.

Plus- the balloon had a pretty stable altitude

Minus - there's a big difference between 15k feet for Skyhook and 60K+ for the balloon. The service ceiling of a C-17 is published as 45k feet.

Otherwise I don't see a problem.

But people's fantasies are far more captivating than scientific data and engineering. Just compare the number of fiction versus non-fiction books published.

Yeah, you're absolutely right. I've been living in a universe with FTL (faster than light) travel and inertial dampening fields since I was a kid.

Sadly it doesn't look like I'm going to live to see it.

The problem with fiction, science fiction in particular, they were written by scientists and engineers that would take fact and give it a little twist.

bit who knows… there are SciFi books from a years ago, that are now,… fact.

I, for one, believe you to be correct on this point.

The toolbox on a fighter jet has hammers - mostly large hammers. So targets are viewed as some type of nail. That’s it.

Angels 60 is way up there, far above the service ceiling of all but a few aircraft.

You intercept and engage with the weapons that you have right now, not the weapons that you wish you had.

OK, just thinking aloud: fight fire with fire. This was a huge balloon; could you deploy a much smaller remotely controlled balloon, with a patch with a hole in it, and, a simple robot. You manoeuvre the "attack" balloon over the target; glue the patch to the canopy, then puncture the "hole".

Yeah, I like that idea. Kind of the reverse of emergency patching a hole in a ship in the water. Place a flexible membrane over the hole. Except the relative pressure would be reversed for the balloon

Seems to me your patch just might prevent a catastrophic blow out when punctured and allow for a somewhat controlled release of gas.

The only problem I see is that all the details of getting the patch to the big balloon would need to be worked out in advance and that would take time. But we need to be prepared for the next balloon.

Luv it!!

Seems a ‘James Bond’ solution to recover what will likely prove to be a cast iron bathtub.

Let’s see... complicated, wondrous, and ridiculously expensive. I like it!

Reminds me of landing a semi-autonomous remote controlled spacecraft on an comet. Difficult? Yes. Expensive? Yes. Wondrous? Yes.

That also meets your criteria. And has been done!

“I am sure ground based telescopes had very high resolution images,even the amateur versions.“

As well as images undoubtedly captured by the varied intercept and pursuit aircraft.

Exactly: talk about a sledge hammer to crack a nut: a few holes in the balloon itself would have brought it down in a controlled way.

Unless there was some intelligence to suggest that it could do more "naughty things" on the way down?

Any suggestions on how to punch a few holes with existing asserts that’s readily available in it at that height?

militarily, weapons are created to destroy hard objects. Not bruise it.,

Hear hear. The only two aircraft we have that can operate at that altitude (with weapons) are the F-22 and the F-35. Their weaponry consists of 20mm cannons and missiles, the least lethal of which is the Aim9X Sidewinder with a 29 pound warhead.

Their weaponry is wholly internal to maintain stealth with no external hardpoints that could be readily adapted to other weapons.

If I've misstated anything please feel free to correct me. The above is what I know based on publicly available info.

I’ve been 30 years out of military assets intel as well as access to Janes, that I would call myself a layman…

Well, I'm some years retired from airborne ISR. Along the line you tend to pick up tidbits on other stuff, especially when aviation technology has taken up most of your life..

Plus there's tons of stuff out on the net from current operators about this incident, much of it more than credible.

I agree…, it’s hard not to pick stuff up when you recognize the potential. That I like to call it speculation, because it’s not first hand knowledge.

Amen to that. Gotta make it clear. It's speculation.

Where was this launched? I know that in WWII Japan sent balloons with explosives where they landed here.

The Chinese always have long term plans, It’s surveillance and intelligence gathering.

find our weaknesses, which they did. They want Taiwan under their wing, and they wanted the U.S. about interfering. This just gives them option. One can only hope we bring competence back to our leadership before this happens.

"Where was this launched?"

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11709963/Canada-probes-potential-second-incident-linked-Chinese-spy-balloon.html

We spend lots of money, time and training NBC to several military and civilian response units. This would have been a good practical exercise. All the training is planned. These incursions are not. Why not use what we have?

Neither did the Emergency Broadcast System alert citizens, just like it remained silent and inert on 11 September 2001.

Information gleaned from what currently passes as news sources tell me 8 or so US fighter planes tracked and engaged the intruder. Two AAM eventually fired, splashing the intruder. Using these breadcrumbs leads me along this path:

Eight US warplanes @ $100,000,000 ~ $800,000,000

Eight US Support aircraft @ $40,000,000 ~ $320,000,000

US Hardware at risk: Approx $1,100,000,000

16 USAF aircraft, 4 hours @ $40,000/operational hour ~ $2,600,000

2 Air to Air missiles (unknown type) @ $1,500,000 ~ $3,000,00

US Out of Pocket for the exercise: Approx $5,500,000.

Intruder Balloon ~ unknown, wild guess about $500,000

The face of Xi Jinping and company when USA demonstrated to the world they will risk or expend resources at a rate of 2,000 to 1 to get a balloon... after allowing the device to loiter for 12 hours or so in US airspace ~ PRICELESS

Not so bad if you classify it as a training exercise, which they need to do anyway

We should have pranked them and dressed up a bunch of excavators like dinosaurs and had everyone put on duck costumes with the excavators chasing them around...

Maybe that's why they flew the balloon over the US? To feel out our defenses and test their strength/response???

My guess is that we knew what this was before it got close to us.

I worked on satellites for the NSA back in the 80's. They were pretty good back then at gathering SIGNIT. A balloon seems rather rudimentary, but I'm sure it had a purpose.

Rudimentary, but cheap and effective.

The balloon also has a much, much longer dwell time than a low earth satellite which makes it a much, much better SIGINT platform for collection.

A lot of speculations going on here, and reminiscing of what they did 40 years ago… unfortunately, the our country’s intelligence and security agencies is not what it was.

anyways, this reminds me of a couple of Canadian teens a few years back that purchase a weather ballon. And came what some people would call, going into space.

it was pretty cool in my opinion.

and if it really was the Chinese, they learned from it.

Sorry, you have ABSOLUTELY no idea of the state of our government's capabilities, then and now! NO IDEA!!!!!!!! NONE!!!!! You only know what Fox News tells you to believe.

Just more speculation on your part that muddies the water.

I should have been more clear. NO ONE here knows the state of our government's capabilities.

Exactly, stop passing your self off as an expert.

Kindly point to any statement I made that said I was an expert!

Quit putting words in my mouth. You are a sick human!!!

You get triggered at the SLIGHTEST hope of putting more words in my mouth.

The fact that I "worked on" satellites was twisted by you, as usual!!!

If you aren't smart enough to accurately understand IT WAS 40 YEARS AGO!

Back when bakelite was the most stable thing in a satellite. And the only plastic.

Hate makes you blind… and deaf…

You just re-enforced what I said already…

fyi,… as far as what comes out of your mouth… that’s up to you,… always has been.

Please, BOTH of you: for the sake of the rest of us, simply stop replying to each other's posts.

I’m fine with that.

You're wrong...

Exception noted.

I'd also add that anybody who is actually cleared, and is aware of our total capabilities probably would not admit it here.

No offense intended but I would suggest limiting your use of absolute statements, like "NO ONE" or "anybody who is actually cleared".

There are likely several here who can have input about such things without running afoul of national security issues.

For example I can safely say that from the pics I've seen on public media there were antenna arrays on the ChiCom balloon that are nearly identical to satcom antennas I've designed for military ISR aircraft. There are no security issues in that statement.

Yes, and even if there are people here with such knowledge, they'd be complete fools to admit it.

True.

I would suggest limiting your use of absolute statements, like "NO ONE"

Decades ago I wrote an editorial for a hobby magazine that we should not use "allness" words because there is always (there I go!) an exception. Instead, use words like few, seldom, most of the time, usually, etc.

OK, you are correct. I'll NEVER do that again.

It was less about the (4+) balloon(s), and their tech, this year than it was about the reaction and mistrust it garnered. The US is in a bad place at the moment, and this adds fuel to an already raging fire.

United we stand, divided we fall, hard. The entire world is watching.

The power and capability of this nation are fairly useless if those in control of it can't work as a unit. The hostility here is nothing compared with what's going on in that big, 5-sided building.

If people on this level can't get past "our" differences just imagine how it must be for the guys who hold the "keys".

You're absolutely right.

And given the latest memo restricting the use of the US Flag by military members at public events, this mess is only going to get worse. The DoD says they're worried about the flag being desecrated by being dragged on the ground during parachute jumps and large horizontal unfolding's. Thus, don't do it anymore.

Pretty soon I believe we're only going to see flags on authorized flagpoles, maybe only on special occasions.

You can call it arrogance, disrespectful, but things are really changing… from what used to be… especially in 1936.

See #14

You have no idea,… what I do know, You’re easily offended when pointing out your short coming,… ya ,… I get that…. Move on.

Exactly.
Why it's a mystery they didn't bring it down over that massively over, and densely, populated state of Montana...

I had thought that an attempt to gently deflate the balloon (20 mm cannon- a few holes) and following it down as the gas, presumably helium, leaked out and compressed. Not sure how the overall buoyancy would be affected as leakage and compression might reach a tipping point where buoyancy (and the balloon, w/ payload) would suddenly plummet. Where exactly the 20 mm cannon would be aimed might influence the tipping point...

At any rate, probably not a good idea to plummet it over a broad target area with any sort of population centers. The payload was described as "as big as a couple of busses". Maybe not very dense but I wouldn't want it to fall on me.

But.... would it be possible to snag it out of the air as it descended through 20,000 feet or so (High side of helicopter capability), if it descended in a controlled manner? Anybody?

The "as big as 3 buses" is very misleading.
The ballon may have been that - when fully inflated at very low external atmospheric pressure...but a weather balloon can NOT lift 3 buses.
The 20mm holes location wouldn't matter that much as the outside pressure will still be greater than the internal at that stage.
The collapsed balloon after being that stretched would act like a big drag vane.

The F-22 carries the M61A2 Vulcan 20mm rotary cannon. A one second burst fires approximately 100 rounds of ball ammo (or tracer, or tracer incendiary) up to 6600 rounds per minute.The rate of fire can be lowered on other aircraft to 4000 rounds per minute but I'm not sure of the F-22.

Burst amount is selectable by the pilot. I believe the minimum burst is 2 or 3 rounds. It's likely even that would be devastating to a balloon.

As far as shooting the balloon down, here is a legal argument...

A very nice, rational explanation without a significant political bias. Thank You.

Here is some more information and an interesting take on the purpose of this balloon...

Arctic research could very well be a reason. That region will become more contentious unless we can manage to cool the earth down.

Would you believe "...the internal pressure will still be greater than the outside pressure at that stage...."

"the smallest caliber weaponry on aircraft that can get up that high is 20 or 30 millimeter canon."

And there was some rule that said they weren't allowed to improvise?

Ummm, do you have any idea how intricate the internal weapon bays are on an F-22? Improvising is not a short term option. Especially when the target is literally an hour or so from passing out of US airspace before they finally decided to take it down.

I'm sure they would be open to options that wouldn't take a year or more and major functional changes to the airframe. Not to mention the bureaucratic nightmare of getting approvals and designing and making the actual changes to the airframe and components. All without compromising the stealthiness and performance of the aircraft.

But I, for one, would be interested in any ideas you may have?

Just removing the "charge" from the AIM-9X would have rendered the strike less destructive.