Multiple eyewitness reports from people on the ground in Montana say they saw the Chinese high-altitude balloon hover in place on Thursday.
The U.S. government officially released a statement Friday afternoon that officials consider the balloon’s entry into Northern America “intentional.”
The Pentagon issued a statement Friday that the balloon is expected to remain over U.S. airspace “for a few days,” Air Force Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder, a Pentagon spokesman.
The balloon was drifting at an altitude of 60,000 feet “somewhere over the center” of the country Friday.
The balloon is being tracked and had been seen over Montana, home to some of the United States’ nuclear missile silos.
The Billings Logan International airport airspace was closed down for several hours Wednesday afternoon according to assistant Director of Aviation and Transit, Shane Ketterling.
“The Salt Lake City FAA tower shut down 50 square miles of air space over the Livingston area fly zone but it was later reopened without incident,” said Ketterling.
The Biden administration has indefinitely postponed Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s trip to Beijing after determining that U.S. sovereignty was violated by what it identified as the Chinese reconnaissance balloon being spotted and tracked above the continental U.S., the State Department said Friday.
The craft, which appears to have high-tech satellite technology including satellite panels, crossed Alaska’s Aleutian Islands and Canada. The Pentagon scrambled jets and at one point considered shooting down the balloon but decided against it. It’s unclear if the balloon poses more of a threat than just flying debris if it is shot down.