The weird just continues to get more and more weird. According to Fox News, the “object” targeted over Lake Huron was engaged by an F-16, firing a “sidewinder missile to attack the target.” However, the first missile missed the target and the military have no idea where it landed. Yikes.
(Fox News) – […] The U.S. military jet that downed an unknown object in the Michigan sky on Sunday missed on its first attempt over Lake Huron, officials told Fox News.
The Air Force F-16 jet was using Sidewinder missiles to attack the target. “The first Sidewinder heat-seeking missile missed the target,” one official said.
It wasn’t clear where the missile that missed ultimately landed. The second missile took down the target. Each of the missiles costs more than $400,000.
None of the debris from the object has been found in the lake, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Monday. The Defense Department, or DOD, said President Biden, just before 2:42 p.m., directed an F-16 to fire an AIM-9x missile to shoot down an airborne object flying at nearly 20,000 feet over Lake Huron. (read more)
N/M
War!
bubbular neutron weapon, I’m sure of it
I was just going to comment on your post above but scrolled down a bit…great minds think alike!
Aggiegirl’s going to name her ‘mythical mad cow’….
“Bubbles”.
TPTB know when you flush your toilet, when you turn on a lamp, and what you bought for lunch at Taco Bell. And what channel your are watching on TV.
They “don’t know”?
Sorry guys, try again.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/13/politics/pentagon-memo-canada-small-balloon/index.html
“The unidentified flying object shot down in Canadian airspace on Saturday appeared to be a “small, metallic balloon with a tethered payload below it,” according to a Pentagon memo sent to lawmakers on Monday and obtained by CNN.
The memo offers the first official details of one of the three objects shot down in recent days that was previously described as a “cylindrical object.” The object crossed near “US sensitive sites” before it was shot down, the memo said.
Defense officials also wrote in the memo to lawmakers that the object shot down over Lake Huron, in Michigan on Sunday, “subsequently slowly descended” into the water after impact.”
So how does an object “shot down” by a sidewinder missile “slowly descend” to the water? Did the missile just puncture the balloon enough to make it leak but not destroy it? And if it descended slowly, why haven’t they found it and the payload? And how does a balloon this size get to the US anyway, if it was of Chinese origin? Are they launching them here in the US (a whole different threat) or is it more likely a domestic source and therefore unrelated to spying?
Most A2A missiles use a proximity fuse. If that didn’t detonate until after passing the object it could puncture it.
What’s all this hubbub about “small metallic balloons”?
Are we forgetting it’s Valentine’s Day?
look, there’s even a hexagonal one … well, pentagonal at least, amirite or amirite?
Clever! 😀
thx … that and a dollar-three-eighty will get me a coffee down the local diner
Amore-ite
Candygram for Brandon. Candygram for Brandon.
Amirite….I buying the Mrs. a beautiful Amirite necklace and matching earings for Valentines day. Thanks for the tip!
Hot air balloon?
Hot air politicians better watch what they are really doing.
Well beyond the old technology now of just “heat seeking.” The missile is locked onto the contrast (object to surrounding sky). Simply a pilot or missile malfunction.
And pollute the land or lake…? With lead?
Meanwhile in East Palestine, Ohio…..
Ditto.
That would be to cheap and efficient.
Exactly! And at only a thousand bucks a round.
And that word “payload”. What is that? Words meant to frighten the people.
1. They can’t shoot balloons down with machine guns – they’re useless. A balloon targeted by Canada and US fighter jets unloaded over a thousand rounds into one to no avail. It slowly came down on its own hours later. So if a missile doesn’t blow up right near it, it’s gonna go down slow because of the remaining material dragging.
2. The payload is suspected to be at the bottom of Huron which is extremely deep.
3. It was most likely a weather balloon launched by noaa or any other number of agencies, universities, corporations, etc that regularly get measurements from balloons. I read somewhere there’s 500 per day launched across North America, 1800 world wide.
Per. Day.
There is a NASA operation in the Great Lakes. I know someone who used to work there.
https://www.nasa.gov/SpaceforUS/?state=greatlakes
I wonder if the Grand Fendwick Air Force is for rent?
The Mouse That Roared.
Funny movie
This:
or is it more likely a domestic source
does not equate to this:
and therefore unrelated to spying
Several days ago, somebody in half-jest suggested that one of the hazards of shooting down a Chinese balloon over middle America might be that the debris would come down onto land owned by the Chinese. They may not agree to allow the USG to enter their property to retrieve the evidence.
The government can go wherever it wants under the auspices of preserving national security. That’s the justification they used to attack the Branch Davidians at Waco as well as the ranchers in Montana. If they wanted to march onto CCP-held land and dance the hokey-pokey, they could do it simply by saying it’s for national security. It would never happen, but at least in theory that’s how it would go.
Eminent Domain could fix that.
“We don’t know what we are shooting at. When we miss with a missile, we don’t know where that errant missile goes. We did not see these objects coming. We don’t know where they came from. We have no pieces of debris to look at.”
“Frankly, we have no idea what the hell we are doing or why we are doing it. We were just lucky to find our way to work today and cannot promise we can find our way in tomorrow or for the rest of the week.”
Is there any intelligent life anywhere inside the U.S. government?
They must think there’s no intelligent life in the civilian world.
They know how many times I opened my garage door…
Easier to claim you launched the balloons via remote, careful what you type!
Short answer? NOPE! “No joke!” to quote a fool.
The communications between the pilots and air boss indicate that the target was small, about the size of a 4-wheeler, making it harder to hit than the previous big balloon in SC.
So… was there really an object? Or is this just blather coming from the pea-brained zealots infesting the Biden occupation government?
I don’t know which scenario is more disturbing:
The fact that our military is firing missiles at objects they haven’t identified, or that they are pretending to be firing missiles
at objects they haven’t identified.
Is there really a difference at this point with this group of merry idiots in government?
First you blow it to smithereens then there is no evidence of made in rhe USA. Boy are we protecting you, look over there, shiny object.
I see this is going to have political capital, potential for both sides…all the “investigations”, strongly worded letters and TV interviews…campaign rhetoric…
Will be interesting to see how the bribem spin masters work this one. The only problem, is it is the spin masters running the country right now.
Am waiting for the pix of the ‘alien life forms’/s
Blather is the most plausible . . .
Hapless and deadly . Bad combo when overhwelming amounts of hardware become your only means of lethality.
Interesting choice of weapon used. Sidewinder air to air missiles are heat seekers. Helium balloons don’t generate heat, so what was the target?
AIM-9s have more than one sensor type.
Every single 1 one of those sensors require a some sort of energy differential emission differential between target to background. Those sensors are OPTICAL and require ENERGY EMISSION differentials between the Target and its background for the OPTICALLY based sensors to detect (measure); for IR, UV, etc.
A balloon has little or no differential in the spectrum’s used by by the OPTICAL sensors of an AIM-9 Missile and the differences between surfaces of the balloon and background fluctuate wildly. That means the 1st missile could NOT keep lock.
More likely somebody forgot to turn on the energy signal source to allow the balloon to be targeted until the 2nd missile was fired or the 2nd missile was a lucky a shot.
The ingrates of DC are an embarrassment to scum.
This sequence of events smells.
If reasonable people can’t make sense of what is going on, then we are not supposed to know. I have read that the USA has been using spy balloons for years. I think all of these activities are linked to our shadow-totalitarian government.
Missile 54 where are you?
Albuquerque and those Hot Air Balloonists better take cover, Biden hates balloons.
So the US military claims to have no idea what it shot at and no idea of the whereabouts of the projectiles that missed.
That is patently absurd. But then again so was the Afghanistan bug out.
This Administration is totally incompetent. Constantly LYING
TIME TO GO
GEN AUSTIN YOU ARE FIRED……………………………..
This slapstick approach to the defense of our airspace is simply jaw dropping. We pay all these taxes for this bullshit?
Our well-trained fighter pilot missed on the first try even though the “object” was slowly moving. We are supposed to believe that Ukrainians can take an abbreviated course in how to fly our fighter jets and will have no problem shooting down a Russian fighter jet flying at roughly the same speed. And we will have to supply the missiles at $400M each?
The balloons and objects are probably ours…meant to track vehicles, movements etc under the guise of national security.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/aug/02/pentagon-balloons-surveillance-midwest
The Great Pretense – that the USA has a duly elected President and the entire Executive Branch is totally not a criminal puppet of a hostile foreign power – continues this Valentine’s Day 2023.
Why, at this point, should anyone continue the pretense one more day?
Post of the day! Really sad what evil they have wrought.
50 cal automatic fire would have done the job for a heck of a lot less money.
More importantly was the pilot a he/him,she/her,it/bot or the most likely and typical male white supremacist pilot afflicted with toxic masculinity and white fragility blurring his vision rendering him unable to perform his duties?
What a freaking joke. Good grief.
If only we had something we could use to track these things like the same way we track, say, thunderstorms and tornados.
Must have been the all girl flying group. Couldn’t hit a balloon? Or maybe it was the dancing dot that we all tried to keep up with in a new song we were learning!
That is the most advanced version of a
Sidewinder. They need to find it.
Question…why would you fire a HEAT seeking weapon against a BALLOON? What is the heat signature of a BALLOON?
I SMELL BULLCRAP!
I would imagine it to be roughly equivalent to the speed of dark.
That’s just the negative of the speed of light. 🙂
Oh Gee Whiz! What is going on here, for real?
Peter Navarro made a couple of excellent points on Bannons Warroom yesterday. His question was why use fighter jets and missiles to take these objects down when there are a multitude of ways to take them down with drones, laser’s, etc., and ways to get them down without blowing them into tiny bits that cannot be recovered?
What brilliant tactician came up with using fighter jets?
…a tactical tail wag, ‘show’ of strength
( to counter compromises
– illegal border crossings,
– nordstream sabotage,
– unaccounted spending,
– $elections
– ukr losing ground, people
– jab issue$
– balloon navigating across entire USA, unchecked etc. )
Why not utilize a grappling hook?
Ballon has teathers according to report.
And, just like that…these equipment posts are showing up on the pro-Russian channels on Twitter and Telegram.
I wonder why…
Because the only thing more dangerous than a Monday morning quarterback is a Monday morning general.
Sam Fender must be having a good laugh as his song plays out…
So, our military just spent $800,000 to shoot down a weather balloon …
Give or take a few 100K on consumables, maintenance costs etc.
Affirmative action in action.
So….They don’t know where the missile landed, nor can they find any wreckage of the “so-called” UFO they SAY they shot down…..WHAT’S WRONG with this story folks? Also, take a look at the flight path of that “Whatever it is”. If you follow the path it took, it clearly came out of Ohio, as far as we can tell. You know, the home of Wright Patterson AFB outside of Dayton, or Lockbourne AFB just south of Columbus….Hmmm….Now what do you REALLY think is happening here?
ALSO, you fire a “Heat Seeking Missile” at a BALLOON? Where would the “HEAT” come from on that balloon?
Whoops!
Wylie E. Coyotay’s way makes more sense. We should put him in charge.
$400,000 for a Sidewinder missile? You can get a really nice hatpin for under $20.
My guess is that they’re shooting at weather balloons and missing on purpose, hoping the missiles land in Russia and start a war.
One more instance of colossal failure from the regime who can’t shoot straight. This is one more point of distress in the fabric of the Republic.
I really, really, feel much safer now that I know the military will use million dollar missals to shoot down mylar birthday balloons.
Liars. They’re lying to us again. They know the area where it landed. The data is recorded by the aircraft firing the missile. They know the altitude and direction from where it was launched. The aircrafts tracking recorded the missile flight path when it missed the target. They just aren’t going to tell anyone since it may have landed in Canada. So for legal reasons and such they just wink, wink, and nod, nod that oops! We don’t know where it went because as NORAD stated elsewhere they’ve “adjusted” their radar tracking capabilities to be able to track everything, such as drones, balloons, and yes even heat seeking air to air missiles. The recovery is most likely being contracted out to some private company with the appropriate security clearances. That is if anyone cared and wasn’t a bunch of incompetent boobs. So maybe they are telling us the truth and have no idea where that missile traveling around Mach 2.5 went.
But keep an eye out for it to show up somewhere, someday. You just never know where it might be now: https://www.ebay.com/itm/281797650001?hash=item419c72e651:g:G-gAAOSw9N1VzBj
Geee …. what could go wrong???
LAUNCH an air to air weapon that requires a heat a differential threshold with its background to stay locked vs a target with very little as well as fluctuating heat differential to background.
Am I the only one wondering about this part?
The Afgans shot our helicpoters down with 7.62 bullets and rpg’s. We’re using jets n 400k missiles to shoot a baloon out of the sky. A ballon that we might want intact to study if it is what they are saying it is.
That’s like elk hunting with a LAW rocket. Seems to me since we’re supposed to be the top military force in the world with the brightest minds in the nation we could come up with a different solution. Especially after the 2nd or 3rd one. They watched most of them for days before they shot them down. Something is amiss.
Firing an impact activated missile at a nebulous bag of gas is simply not going to work out well. If those missiles do not have a self destruct capability when the propellant is depleted, or beyond a specific distance from launch, or timing detonate they I need to go back to work designing scientific equipment.
First instinct: why do we believe that they’ve shot down anything? 2nd: So what? If so, Putin or Xi have to be laughing their tails off. In another week or two, North Korea or outer Mongolia will be sending up Amazon delivered weather balloons just to get in on the act.
They used F-16’s?
Old tech planes, using older tech heat-seeking missiles? Hmmm….
Why did they not use Predator or Reaper drones instead? Might the RX-9 Hellfire missile be better at taking out the “UFO”/surveillance balloon?
Just some questions over coffee this morning….
Me thinks these massive continuous never ending blunders are all purposely planned. Not only do these events advance the agenda but everyone in both parties and the complicit media can comfortably point the finger and blame Biden. That way they can usher in another puppet who is innocent and can deceive the voters in 2024. Everything is well scripted and orchestrated.
Each of the missiles costs more than $400,000.
USAF version of the AIM-9X is $472,000.
Actually, it’s amazing they can hit them at all since the AIM-9 series are infrared guided missiles that looks for heat differences to home in on, like a jet exhaust. The latest version and the one being used, the AIM-9X, uses a much more sensitive imaging infrared system, so it must be able to detect far smaller temperature variations.
That aligns with my thought. Why on earth fire a heat-seeking missile at a balloon, which normally don’t have any significant heat signature? It’s not like this is a low-altitude hot-air balloon with passengers and a giant propane burner.
It’s probably the small difference between the heat signatures of background sky and the balloon that the missile’s IMAGING infrared system can (barely) see.
Our radar directed missiles are even more expensive, a LOT more, and in the case of these most recent balloons, with the possible exception of the metallic looking (aluminized mylar?) cylindrical one, probably don’t have enough radar reflectivity for a radar homing missile to home in on.
Gatling cannon fire could be better or, at least, MUCH cheaper, but these are very small targets. Also, there is this history to be concerned about although this was for a VERY large science balloon:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidhambling/2023/02/03/busting-that-chinese-balloon-is-harder-than-you-think/?sh=286b94167d6a
We know that large balloons are hard to shoot down from previous experience. In 1998 a rogue Canadian weather balloon drifted towards Russian airspace. Fighter jets from Canada, Norway and Sweden attempted to bring it down without success. Two Canadian air force CF-18 fighters hit the balloon with more than 1,000 rounds of 20mm cannon fire off the coast of Newfoundland, riddling it with holes. This was not enough to let a significant amount of gas out, and the balloon continued drifting.
A volley of 2.75” rockets was equally ineffective, as the high-explosive rockets simply flew though the balloon without detonating. This may be the Air Force’s real concern with intercepting the Chinese balloon: any missile fired at it may be a much greater hazard to civilians below than the balloon itself, which is likely to descend slowly if at all. (The Canadian balloon drifted into Russian territory and is believed to have come down in the Arctic Sea).
Attack the sensors/C2 systems on the balloon.
My guess is we have weapon systems capable of splashinging balloons. Perhaps we don’t want to verify that this is the case.
a retired mil pilot told me the sun glint off of the balloon is often enough couped w/the AIM9X advanced sensors
Or, this whole thing is just another lie and no missile was ever fired.
Precisely! Look here not there…..
If a missile was fired and missed, the O’ByDN* administration is happy to report that. IMHO, they enjoy showing us their incompetence.
Seems like a nearly stationary target would be a good opportunity to practice gun skills. A few rounds from the gun couldn’t cost very much, right?