While China maintains the balloon was a civilian airship “used for research, mainly meteorological, purposes,” Pentagon officials say it was “being used by the PRC in an attempt to surveil strategic sites in the continental United States.”
Though the balloon has since been shot down by F22 fighter jets, it captured the country’s attention for days with questions of national security and international relations. Below is a timeline of the balloon’s journey over the country and what is known about its mission.
On Tuesday, January 31, a massive, high-altitude balloon was spotted over the Aleutian Islands in Alaska.
The balloon was equipped with a “large payload underneath the surveillance component,” Pentagon officials say.
While the exact dimensions and features of the balloon are unclear, it was spotted floating at approximately 60,000 feet — well above the range of civilian air traffic, according to the Pentagon.
Brigadier General Pat Ryder, the Pentagon press secretary, said in a statement emailed to Insider that the balloon had “a large payload underneath the surveillance component,” but noted that it presented “no physical or military threat to people on the ground.”
Though there were immediate calls to shoot down the device, officials cautioned that it’s not that simple, in part because fighter aircraft aren’t designed to target balloons.
When a weather balloon went rogue 25 years ago, two Royal Canadian Air Force CF-18 fighter aircraft fired more than 1,000 rounds at it and couldn’t shoot it down.
On Wednesday, February 1, the balloon made its way across Canada, being spotted in Alberta and Saskatchewan.
The government of Canada on Thursday confirmed the device had been in its airspace and was coordinating with the United States military to track it.
Thursday, February 2 was the first time United States officials acknowledged they were tracking the balloon, which had been sighted floating over Billings, Montana.
By Friday, February 3, the balloon had made its way across the central United States, being spotted in Kansas City, Missouri.
As the balloon made its way across the states, over the state of Missouri, officials acknowledged balloon surveillance has been seen from China before.
“It is not the first time that you’ve had a balloon of this nature cross over the continental United States,” a senior US defense official told reporters on Thursday. “It’s happened a handful of other times over the past few years, to include before this administration. It is appearing to hang out for a longer period of time this time around, more persistent than in previous instances, so that would be one distinguishing factor.”
At least three balloons were discovered over the US during the Trump administration, AP reported. In 1957, China claimed it shot down what it identified as a “spy balloon,” though US Navy called it “a weather experiment that had blown off course,” according to the US Naval Institute.
On Friday, a second balloon was spotted over Latin America, according to Pentagon officials.
A Department of Defense spokesperson confirmed to Insider that the second balloon was of Chinese origins, but declined to give additional details, such as where the second balloon was spotted.
On Saturday, Colombian officials confirmed in a statement that the balloon had been seen in its airspace hovering at 55,000 feet. The Colombian Air Force followed the object until it left the country.
It is unclear where the second balloon is currently located.
The first balloon ultimately made it to the Atlantic coast, near Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, where it was shot down on Saturday, February 4.
The balloon was shot down by F22 jets on Saturday after it reached the Atlantic Ocean, near the coast of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
“I ordered the Pentagon to shoot it down on Wednesday as soon as possible,” Biden said. “They decided that the best time to do that was when it got over water within a 12-mile limit.”
Officials are seeking to recover the debris from the wreckage to determine what additional information can be learned from the device. It is unclear what exactly China was searching for with the balloons.
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China flew spy balloons over the US while Donald Trump was president, but nobody realized until after he left office, according to multiple reports.
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After the US shot down the suspected Chinese spy balloon over the Atlantic on Saturday, senior defense officials said it had not been the first time there had been incursions like this in US airspace.
In a press briefing on Saturday, the officials said that other suspected Chinese surveillance balloons had crossed into the US at least three times during the Trump administration, and once earlier in the Biden administration.
Details of the incidents were not provided, though The Washington Post, citing US officials, reported that the earlier sightings had been near Texas, Florida, Hawaii, and Guam.
Two of these sightings, in Hawaii and Guam, have been reported previously, The Post said.
What set the previous balloon flights apart is that they were much shorter in duration, which may be why some of them went undetected at the time, a senior administration official told The Wall Street Journal.
The sightings were only discovered “after the prior administration left,” senior defense officials told both The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.
The comments come after Trump and ex-national security officials said they were not aware of spy balloons flying over the US during the former president’s administration.
“It never happened with us under the Trump administration and if it did, we would have shot it down immediately,” Trump told Fox News Digital on Sunday. “It’s disinformation.”
Former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper told CNN on Friday: “I don’t ever recall somebody coming into my office or reading anything that the Chinese had a surveillance balloon above the United States. I would remember that for sure.”
It’s also unclear if balloons spotted during the Trump administration were shot down. A Pentagon spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.
Republican lawmakers have criticized the Biden administration for being too slow to shoot down the foreign object.
House Intelligence Chair Rep. Mike Turner told NBC News on Sunday: “I think this administration lacks urgency. There’s no excuses here.”
“This should have been taken down before it entered U.S. airspace when it was over Alaska,” Turner added.
The balloon was first seen flying over Alaska’s Aleutian Islands on January 28, before it flew over Canada, and then over some intercontinental ballistic missile sites in Montana, the Pentagon said.
The military is still working to collect the debris in the Atlantic Ocean, but it’s likely that pieces could wash ashore, officials in neighboring North Carolina said.
