Chinese "weather" balloon floating over the US

[Omega]

41 minutes ago, Alleycat72 said:

It's -60° up there so and it did get hit with something that went boom.

Which is another mystery, why shoot a missile?  A few well placed 20mm rounds into the body of the balloon could have made less of a mess of the payload, possibly letting us recover more of it to study.  

[btq96r]

1 hour ago, Omega said:

Which is another mystery, why shoot a missile?  A few well placed 20mm rounds into the body of the balloon could have made less of a mess of the payload, possibly letting us recover more of it to study.  

Why are you so anti-profit for Raytheon? 

[Alleycat72]

2 hours ago, Omega said:

Which is another mystery, why shoot a missile?  A few well placed 20mm rounds into the body of the balloon could have made less of a mess of the payload, possibly letting us recover more of it to study.  

This is what happened last time one got shot down. 

 

 

[Omega]

1 hour ago, btq96r said:

Why are you so anti-profit for Raytheon? 

I'm not, but they will already be behind schedule replacing all the armament going to Ukraine, don't need to be wasting what we have left.

[Omega]

1 hour ago, Alleycat72 said:

This is what happened last time one got shot down. 

 

 

Funny, but some things can be learned from that.  First, civilians can reach international airspace.  If a small armed drone can be lifted up there in that manner, maybe it can engage the next balloon somewhere over the Pacific.  Oh, and also that plastic, or rubber? freezes or becomes extremely brittle at those altitudes, so one may need better materials for anything you send up there.

[Capbyrd]

On 2/4/2023 at 4:07 PM, Links2k said:

 

My beliefs concerning this incident are more in line with these two takes I found online. Also, DOD mentioned that they were able obscure or relocate assets in the balloon’s path. Intelligence gathering seems to be the most logical reason for allowing the balloon drift across the country after assessing it posed no imminent threat to the country. 

But it’s more fun to blame Biden and be pissy.  Someone said if Trump was still in office it would have been shot down.  But if he didn’t, I’d bet his supporters would be saying the same as you and calling him smart. 
 

I just waved at it when I went outside and went on with my life.  I’m not interested in starting a new Cold War with our superiors. 

[RED333]

[Erik88]

5 hours ago, Capbyrd said:

But it’s more fun to blame Biden and be pissy.  Someone said if Trump was still in office it would have been shot down.  But if he didn’t, I’d bet his supporters would be saying the same as you and calling him smart. 
 

 

Yep. If he had shot it down over land and it destroyed a house or business he would be getting crucified for that too. The debris field is covering 7 miles of ocean. There were not a lot of good options. 

Canada also chose to let it pass through their airspace. 

[Chucktshoes]

2 hours ago, Erik88 said:

Yep. If he had shot it down over land and it destroyed a house or business he would be getting crucified for that too. The debris field is covering 7 miles of ocean. There were not a lot of good options. 

Canada also chose to let it pass through their airspace. 

Canada is nearly a wholly owned subsidiary of the CCCP. 

[deerslayer]

2 hours ago, Erik88 said:

Yep. If he had shot it down over land and it destroyed a house or business he would be getting crucified for that too. The debris field is covering 7 miles of ocean. There were not a lot of good options. 

Canada also chose to let it pass through their airspace. 

Supposedly it was discovered over Alaska, which is 2.5x the size of Texas and has a smaller population than Shelby County.  I'll bet a suitable area to shoot it down over Alaska could have been quickly identified.  Biden claims he wasn't notified about the balloon until several days later and wanted it shot down immediately, but was apparently vetoed.  Assuming he is telling the truth and assuming he is actually in charge, Biden should have some DoD heads on a platter.  

China made the US look like incompetent idiots, and they are probably not finished.

Edited February 6, 2023 by deerslayer

[Alleycat72]

2 hours ago, Erik88 said:

Yep. If he had shot it down over land and it destroyed a house or business he would be getting crucified for that too. The debris field is covering 7 miles of ocean. There were not a lot of good options. 

Canada also chose to let it pass through their airspace. 

6.9999 miles of latex. 50 square feet of aluminum. 

[deerslayer]

I guess Chinese bombers can now assume safe passage across the US because MUH DEBRIS

[Chucktshoes]

I’m not sure why a balloon is such a big deal when you’re all carrying Chinese spy devices in your pockets. 

[FUJIMO]

2 minutes ago, Chucktshoes said:

I’m not sure why a balloon is such a big deal when you’re all carrying Chinese spy devices in your pockets. 

Same thing I told someone over the weekend as they tiky'd their toky lol. I'm more worried about what the ballon is a distraction for .

[GlockSpock]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/05/politics/chinese-spy-balloons-trump-administration/index.html

[Omega]

26 minutes ago, GlockSpock said:

https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/05/politics/chinese-spy-balloons-trump-administration/index.html

LMFAO

Quote

Chinese spy balloons under Trump not discovered until after Biden took office

 

[Chucktshoes]

2 hours ago, GlockSpock said:

https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/05/politics/chinese-spy-balloons-trump-administration/index.html

Yeah, this smells like a whole bunch of cope. 

[Jeb48]

Not going to get in the big debate, my opinion has been stated by others and it no longer matters. What I don't understand is why they shot it down with what looked like a missile instead of just shooting a few holes in it and let it come down in one piece at a slower rate. Would make collecting the bits a lot easier.

[Omega]

33 minutes ago, Jeb48 said:

Not going to get in the big debate, my opinion has been stated by others and it no longer matters. What I don't understand is why they shot it down with what looked like a missile instead of just shooting a few holes in it and let it come down in one piece at a slower rate. Would make collecting the bits a lot easier.

I had the same question, but seen a vid where the guy made a good argument, sort of.  Apparently the missile didn't have a payload, so he compared it to shooting an arrow vs a shotgun.  And another issue I'm not sure anyone touched on, is the F22 has a ceiling lower than the 60-65k feet the balloon was at so the angle may not have been conducive to using the gun and still minimising damage.  

[Capbyrd]

I think we figured out the real reason they sent that balloon. They were checking on their pandas. 
 

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/giant-panda-named-le-le-dies-after-20-years-at-memphis-zoo/

[peejman]

9 hours ago, Omega said:

I had the same question, but seen a vid where the guy made a good argument, sort of.  Apparently the missile didn't have a payload, so he compared it to shooting an arrow vs a shotgun.  And another issue I'm not sure anyone touched on, is the F22 has a ceiling lower than the 60-65k feet the balloon was at so the angle may not have been conducive to using the gun and still minimising damage.  

Correct. The ballon was well above the service ceiling of our fighters. The F22 flew up to about 40k feet and let the missile climb the rest of the way to the balloon.

I suspect part of the delay was waiting for the submarine with the recovery team to get in position. 

[Alleycat72]

Does anyone actually believe the published ceiling for any military aircraft or crush depth of any submarine? 

[Chucktshoes]

4 minutes ago, Alleycat72 said:

Does anyone actually believe the published ceiling for any military aircraft or crush depth of any submarine? 

There’s some wiggle room as the ceilings are set for pilot safety and airframe longevity, but yes, I do. Can they exceed them, yes. Is it safe to do so? It gets real sketchy real fast. 
 

(This is based off of my understanding of the F-16s that I worked on when I was in the AF.)

[RED333]

1 hour ago, peejman said:

I suspect part of the delay was waiting for the submarine with the recovery team to get in position. 

Sub won’t submerg unless there is 500 feet of water under the hull. Seems I read the water was only 50 or so feet deep.

[Alleycat72]

2 hours ago, Chucktshoes said:

There’s some wiggle room as the ceilings are set for pilot safety and airframe longevity, but yes, I do. Can they exceed them, yes. Is it safe to do so? It gets real sketchy real fast. 
 

(This is based off of my understanding of the F-16s that I worked on when I was in the AF.)

My thought was we may want to lie to the enemy about the capability of our toys.