Kirby: US shot down aircraft over Alaska

The United States on Friday shot down an unidentified object flying over Alaska, its ownership is unknown, informs Reuters, citing White House National Security Council strategic communications coordinator John Kirby.

“We don’t know who owns this facility,” Kirby said. According to him, it is not clear where the device began its flight.

According to Pentagon spokesman General Patrick Ryder, an object the size of a small car was shot down on February 10 by an F-22 fighter. The Pentagon and the White House, according to Reuters, refused to give a detailed description of it, saying only that it was much smaller than the Chinese balloon, which was previously shot down off the coast of South Carolina. The object is known to have flown in a northeasterly direction at an altitude of 12,190 meters and is said to have created a “danger to civil air traffic”. The device was shot down off the coast of northeastern Alaska near the Canadian border. Its wreckage, officials said, would be much easier to retrieve from the ice than a destroyed Chinese balloon, parts of which sank into the ocean.

According to Ryder, before destroying the apparatus, the pilots made sure that there were no people on board. In connection with the incident, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) closed part of the airspace in northern Alaska.

On February 4, a Chinese balloon was shot down over the Atlantic Ocean, about 19 km off the coast of North Carolina. After that, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said that Washington’s decision to shoot down the balloon caused damage to relations between the two countries. Beijing strongly protested and urged to avoid further actions that escalate tension and damage China’s interests.

Washington believes that the balloon was engaged in “observation of strategic objects.” His route lay near the positions of intercontinental ballistic missiles and the air base of strategic bombers. The Chinese side claims that the balloon was a meteorological probe.