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F-16 Balloon kill markings?


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I absolutely hope they put a balloon kill mark on the jet.

 

Looks like it was a F-22 though.  The picture/video I saw clearly shows a F-22 in the bottom corner of the frame showing the collapsed balloon.  Kind of amazed that a AIM-9X could lock onto a balloon.  Can’t imagine there was much of a heat signature.

 

Any pictures or data were probably already transmitted off the payload.

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49 minutes ago, Dave Williams said:

I absolutely hope they put a balloon kill mark on the jet.

 

Looks like it was a F-22 though.  The picture/video I saw clearly shows a F-22 in the bottom corner of the frame showing the collapsed balloon.  Kind of amazed that a AIM-9X could lock onto a balloon.  Can’t imagine there was much of a heat signature.

 

Any pictures or data were probably already transmitted off the payload.

 

No doubt whatever data it was meant to provide to the sender, it's already done so. But I'm confident the splashdown zone was already well prepared for U.S. recovery - examining it up close will tell a lot about what it was really designed to do (spoiler alert: not "climate science").

 

From the right solar orientation I would assume getting an IR lock on a highly reflective metallic balloon in an otherwise clear, cold sky would be pretty simple.  Shame they needed to spend an AAM at all though, the M-17 Mystic was designed to down NATO "weather" balloons with just an internal gun.

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40 minutes ago, Niels said:

Would have thought a couple of 20mm or 23mm rounds would bring it down fairly relaxed? 

Canadians tried shooting down a weather balloon 25 years.  Took 6 days to go down.

 

https://news.yahoo.com/weather-balloon-went-rogue-almost-161314996.html

 

The problem is the things have a  massive surface area, and the difference in pressure between the inside and outside is very small, so it takes quite a while for enough helium to leak out.  Plus, the balloon likely has a helium tank to make up for losses that will keep it up for a while.

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1 hour ago, Niels said:

Would have thought a couple of 20mm or 23mm rounds would bring it down fairly relaxed? 

Actually a lot harder as the ballon wasn't fully inflared, you'd have to punch a bunch of holes into it.

 

One report said it landed in 47 feet of water, the one video showed what looked like a smooth, not too rapid descent.  They'll get some intel out of it; though China got a ton of intel out of it.

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From "The Merge"

The End

Early Saturday morning (Feb 4th), the balloon was spotted over the Carolinas, and aviation sleuths noticed the FAA had issued a massive Temporary Flight Restriction (TFR) off the coast of South Carolina that blocked all civilian traffic.

We’ll let the dust settle for the final list of military assets put into motion to shoot down a simple balloon, but we’re tracking: F-15Cs, F-22s, numerous tankers, an E-3 AWACS, 1 Navy P-8 Poseidon, 1 Coast Guard C-130, 4 Navy ships, and a partridge in a pear tree.

Anyhoo, once the order was given, F-22s lit the burners, climbed above 50,000 feet, and lined up for the shot.

Due to the altitude, the Raptor had to use a missile. Why: the stealthy F-22 is restricted from shooting its gun above 50,000 feet due to the design limits of the gun door (when the trigger is pulled, the door pops open, exposing the gun barrel to shoot).

The balloon was somewhere around 60-65,000 feet, and the lead Raptor took the shot at 58,000 feet.

Fox 2! The pilot fired an AIM-9X, which uses an imaging IR (IIR) Focal Plane Array (FPA) seeker, the same tech used in sensitive thermal cameras. Here’s a sweet video showing the AIM-9X shacking the balloon payload and subsequently popping the balloon.

The balloon’s payload is now sitting in 47 feet of water; the Navy and Coast Guard are working on retrieving the payload

 

Fun Fact: The F-22s flew with the callsign Frank. Why: the F-22s were from the 27th Fighter Squadron and have air combat lineage going back over 100 years to a guy named Frank Luke—the first airman awarded the Medal of Honor and famous for shooting down balloons during World War I. The 27th Fighter Squadron “Fightin’ Eagles” proudly carry that heritage today—their mascot is a cherished stuffed toy eagle named Frank. We'd bet money that Frank was in the cockpit for the shot.


Parting thought: The F-22's 58,000 AIM-9X shot against the ~60,000-foot target may be the highest altitude air-to-air kill in history. For the record, balloons have been considered valid kills since World War I.

 

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17 minutes ago, ElectroSoldier said:

So the F-22s first air to air kill was a weather balloon? 

Recon balloon,  terrain mapping ballon for missile guidance, weather pattern balloon for weather manipulation weaponization program, may reasons, think about it, you want to spend 20 billion on a high altitude strategic bomber, how do you answer the question, can the Americans shoot it down?  They manipulated weather for their olympics, why wouldn't they use it on us if they could? hell even make a virus that spreads wildly and crushes your economy, nothing is off limits, detonate an underground nuke on a fault line and across the world a major city collapses, they are working on all of it while we cant figure out if kids are boys or girls.  I'd love to see what's that balloons payload.  I hate all the photoshopped kill markings on the net, complicates things if you want to build a real replica, I need to know markings and which paint scheme the real bird had

Edited by DarkKnight
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1 hour ago, DarkKnight said:

Recon balloon,  terrain mapping ballon for missile guidance, weather pattern balloon for weather manipulation weaponization program, may reasons, think about it, you want to spend 20 billion on a high altitude strategic bomber, how do you answer the question, can the Americans shoot it down?  They manipulated weather for their olympics, why wouldn't they use it on us if they could? hell even make a virus that spreads wildly and crushes your economy, nothing is off limits, detonate an underground nuke on a fault line and across the world a major city collapses, they are working on all of it while we cant figure out if kids are boys or girls.  I'd love to see what's that balloons payload.  I hate all the photoshopped kill markings on the net, complicates things if you want to build a real replica, I need to know markings and which paint scheme the real bird had

How long have you had your tin foil hat?

 

What if, and I know its completely wild as an idea but what if it was simply a weather balloon up there making a weather survey?

 

I guess only time will tell, once they examine the wreckage we will know, or not know depending on what they decide to tell us.

 

Oh and so you know I am not a supporter of the CCP in any way at all. I cant stand them in fact. 

Edited by ElectroSoldier
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18 hours ago, Dave Williams said:

I absolutely hope they put a balloon kill mark on the jet.

 

Looks like it was a F-22 though.  The picture/video I saw clearly shows a F-22 in the bottom corner of the frame showing the collapsed balloon.  Kind of amazed that a AIM-9X could lock onto a balloon.  Can’t imagine there was much of a heat signature.

 

Any pictures or data were probably already transmitted off the payload.

Have you got a link to this video?
The one I saw would have you guessing if it was a jet at all. All I could see for sure was the con trails. 

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2 hours ago, jbryan911 said:


Parting thought: The F-22's 58,000 AIM-9X shot against the ~60,000-foot target may be the highest altitude air-to-air kill in history. For the record, balloons have been considered valid kills since World War I.

 

 What about the F-15 ASAT kill?  Launched at ~38k ft and destroyed the target at 320 miles (~1,700,000 ft) above the surface

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41 minutes ago, ElectroSoldier said:

How long have you had your tin foil hat?

 

What if, and I know its completely wild as an idea but what if it was simply a weather balloon up there making a weather survey?

 

I guess only time will tell, once they examine the wreckage we will know, or not know depending on what they decide to tell us.

 

Oh and so you know I am not a supporter of the CCP in any way at all. I cant stand them in fact. 

 

 

Edited by DarkKnight
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1 minute ago, habu2 said:

 

 What about the F-15 ASAT kill?  Launched at ~38k ft and destroyed the target at 320 miles (~1,700,000 ft) above the surface

maybe the satellite was in space and the balloon still in our atmosphere so 2 different kinds of kills, does pilot get a medal for this?

 

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3 minutes ago, DarkKnight said:

 

 

tin foil? I do recall there were attacks on the US mainland in WW2, this isnt a new idea.  Our own government claims this balloon can be maneuvered, In China they scan your phone for porno or muslim stuff they dont want you to have, then send you to reeducation camp, they use unsuspecting rubes to runaround and say this stuff doesnt happen, look up "white  monkey jobs in china"  "They" are capable of anything to defeat us, tiktok? social media platforms to spread lies,  people influencing kids to be "trans", its happening. Who drops off bricks at "protests" in America? maybe them, Soviet Union did similar stuff to us in the sixties.  Tinfoil? or reality, you decide, buy some Chinese phone and get their spyware in your computer, remember when the Korean Fatboy got mad about something and China handed him all of Sonys email, underestimating your opponent is not a good idea.  I'm wondering what that payload gondala had in it, I'd like it in 1/48

 

1 minute ago, DarkKnight said:

maybe the satellite was in space and the balloon still in our atmosphere so 2 different kinds of kills, does pilot get a medal for this?

 

 

Ok Im going to take a step back from this and say
Yeah I think your right in hopes we can just leave that alone before it turns into a dumpster fire of a conversation.

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