Frequent Flyers

In an unusual flurry of activity over the skies of North America, a US F-22 Raptor fighter jet downed an unidentified flying object over Canada on Saturday. The pilot was acting on the orders of US President Biden and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau when he shot down the cylindrically shaped object of a yet-determined origin.

Mr. Trudeau recently announced in a statement on Twitter: “I ordered the takedown of an unidentified object that violated Canadian airspace.“

NORAD, the North American Aerospace Command, is (according to their website) “a United States and Canada bi-national organization charged with the missions of aerospace warning, aerospace control and maritime warning for North America. Aerospace warning includes the detection, validation, and warning of attack against North America, whether by aircraft, missiles, or space vehicles, through mutual support arrangements with other commands.” 

The Prime Minister specified that Canadian and American fighters were scrambled, and it was a US F-22 that fired on the target with what we like to call in the military “good effect.” The object was over the Yukon Territory when its flight abruptly ended.

The incident comes just one day after President Biden ordered another unidentified aircraft to be shot down near Alaska on Friday. US forces near the Alaskan town of Deadhorse are recovering the wreckage of that object.

Regarding the most recent aerial activity, Mr. Trudeau stated, “Canadian Forces will now recover and analyze the wreckage of the object.” As reported in The New York Times, Biden has discussed with Trudeau the “importance of recovering the object in order to determine more details on its purpose or origin.”

An American missile is shown fractions of a second before destroying an unidentified object over North American airspace. Screenshot from YouTube and ABC News Australia.

From a news conference in Ottawa, Anita Anand, the Canadian Defense Minister, announced that the entity had been traveling at around 40,000 feet when it was brought down at 3:41 EST Saturday, roughly 100 miles from the US-Canada border. Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and Canadian Armed Forces are conducting a recovery operation so that the object may be studied and identified. Major Oliver Gallant, a spokesman for NORAD, informed the press that the military has determined what the craft is, but they are not yet making that information public. Anand will not speculate whether she believes the craft to be from China.

“We are continuing to do the analysis on the object, and we will make sure that analysis is thorough,” she said. “It would not be prudent for me to speculate on the origins of the object at this time.”

Mere hours after her announcement, NORAD had once again discovered a “radar anomaly” over the United States, prompting them to briefly close some of the airspace over Montana and launch more fighter aircraft to investigate. The aircraft returned to base after reportedly not seeing any physical objects to correlate with what they observed on radar.

A Guessing Game

So, NORAD has admitted they know what they have but are refusing to share the information with the public at this time. One must wonder why. What harm could come from releasing the information? Politicians from Montana certainly want to know. Shortly after airspace over their state had been closed again, Senators Steve Daines and Jon Tester from “Big Sky Country” were in touch with the Pentagon and wanted some answers.

Since we are being forced to speculate, I should note that the Canadian Defense Minister did not use the word “balloon” to describe the unidentified craft flying over Canada. Later, however, Canadian General Wayne Eyre, Chief of the Defense Staff, stated that (according to the Washington Post) the instructions given to fighter pilots was “whoever had the first, best shot to take out the balloon had the go-ahead.”

It seems like we are being tested, most likely by the Chinese. China’s response to our taking out their balloon off the coast of South Carolina was that they “reserved the right to take further actions.” What those actions were, they did not specify. In time, we will likely be able to ferret out their true intentions.

Until then, let us know what you think in the comments. We’d be interested to find out what’s on your mind.