Biden ordered the shooting down because the subject posed a “reasonable threat” to the airline industry.
Washington:
The White House said a US fighter jet shot down an unidentified object in Alaska on Friday, although the purpose or origin of the target remains unclear.
“The president ordered the military to take down the object,” said National Security Council spokesman John Kirby. He said the incident happened within the last hour, at around 19:30 GMT.
Kirby said the object was much smaller than a giant Chinese balloon that flew over the US last week and was shot down by a US fighter jet off the Atlantic coast on Saturday.
He said it was “about the size of a small car” and was flying at about 40,000 feet.
It plunged into northern Alaska, near the Canadian border, and fell into icy waters, making recovery possible, Mr.
“We hope to be able to recover the debris, as it not only landed in our territorial space, but we believe it is frozen water, so recovery efforts will be made.” , he said.
Biden ordered the shooting down because the subject posed a “reasonable threat” to the airline industry.
But Kirby stresses that nothing is known about the object yet.
“We don’t know who owns it, whether state-owned or corporate-owned,” he said. “We don’t understand the purpose fully.”
However, the US military sent a plane to observe the object before it was shot down and “the pilot’s assessment is that the object is unmanned”.
(Except for the title, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from an aggregated feed.)
