US shoots down airship over Atlantic after China balloon, China threatens retaliation

Virginia, February 06: Taking a action against the Chinese balloon that was allegedly spying oni mportant military installations around the United States, USA Department of Defense’s fighter jets has shot down the balloon over US territorial seas. The video of the incident has went viral on social media.

As per the Pentagon, at 14:39 EST (19:39 GMT), an F-22 jet fighter fired one AIM-9X Sidewinder missile at the high-altitude balloon, which caused it to crash six nautical miles off the US coast. Currently, the military is working to recover debris that is dispersed over a seven-mile area (11km). There are two naval ships nearby, one of which has a large crane for rescue.

In a Pentagon statement a senior US defence official said that "while we took all necessary steps to protect against the PRC [China] surveillance balloon's collection of sensitive information, the surveillance balloon's overflight of US territory was of intelligence value to us.

"We were able to study and scrutinise the balloon and its equipment, which has been valuable," the official added.

US President Joe Biden had been under pressure to shoot it down since defence officials first announced they were tracking it on Thursday.

Meanwhile, China's foreign ministry later expressed "strong dissatisfaction and protest against the US's use of force to attack civilian unmanned aircraft".