The US military has shot down an unknown object again, the Pentagon reported late Sunday evening. This time above Lake Huron, near the border with Canada. Earlier this weekend, two flying objects were also shot down over the US and Canada, and a suspected Chinese surveillance balloon was shot down more than a week ago.
“At the direction of President Biden and based on recommendations from Secretary Austin and the military leadership, an F-16 fired an AIM9x this afternoon, successfully shooting down a flying object,” the Pentagon writes in a statement. a statement. “The object was flying at an altitude of about 20,000 feet (over 6,000 meters) in US airspace over Lake Huron, Michigan.”
Read also: After Chinese balloon also flying objects downed over Alaska and Canada
The Pentagon did not view the object as a military threat to any ground target, but as a “danger to airspace” and a threat “because of its possible surveillance capabilities.”
Chinese balloon
After the white balloon from China that was shot down on February 4 off the coast of South Carolina, the US and Canadian Air Forces are on extra alert for unknown objects.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the balloon was “intended to monitor strategic locations on the US mainland”, but China denies this, saying it was a civilian research aircraft that had gone off-direction.
The incident led to diplomatic tensions between the US and China and the provisional cancellation of a visit to Beijing by Foreign Minister Antony Blinken.
The investigation into the objects shot out of the sky this weekend is still ongoing, but according to a White House spokesman, they were “much smaller” than the Chinese balloon and did not resemble it.