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F-16 Balloon kill markings?


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3 hours ago, Crash Test Dummy said:

😀Of course, you'd find the one experimental powered balloon project from 50 years ago, way to feed the conspiracy nuts. 👽  The rednecks from my hometown in Missouri were melting down over this one, because they could literally see it from their backyard. They were torn between shoot it down or it's full of biological weapons so don't shoot it down. My Facebook feed was nuts for a couple days.

 

I ran across a RAND Corporation report discussing high altitude airships and the powered balloon concept isn't mentioned, but the report does describe another system (pg 47). Suspend a wing and rudder 15 km below the balloon envelope and the difference in wind speed gives you energy to work with, the wing can now act like a sail and provide limited steering.

 

I'm honestly surprised I've never heard of the powered balloon program before, but doing a little Googling, I can find no indication this project ever continued beyond the one program or even the one flight. It's certainly didn't become common. And, there's no indication the Chinese balloon was equipped with such a system.  I still think it was limited to altitude changes for maneuvering.

Thanks for the links to the very interesting reports: note that the RAND report does describe designs with propeller-driven propulsion for both cruise and to offset the static lift for landing.  I had assumed initially that altitude changes were being used to control its flight path. One early morning at Black Forest Glider Port (just east of the Rocky Mountain foothills) in Colorado, I saw an intended close-circuit flight of a hot air balloon. By climbing and descending some hundreds of feet, it went east-southeast for a while, at least a couple of miles away, then north, then back west to land back within the airport boundary. Balloon contests usually involve a game of Hare and Hounds that require the same use of wind direction changes with altitude. However, I don't think that, just using the winds at 60,000 feet plus or minus 5 or 10,000 feet, you would be able to maneuver a balloon launched from China precisely enough to be in the same corner of a state as the intended target, much less  being over something that you wanted to surveil.

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4 hours ago, Crash Test Dummy said:

😀Of course, you'd find the one experimental powered balloon project from 50 years ago, way to feed the conspiracy nuts. 👽  The rednecks from my hometown in Missouri were melting down over this one, because they could literally see it from their backyard. They were torn between shoot it down or it's full of biological weapons so don't shoot it down. My Facebook feed was nuts for a couple days.

 

I ran across a RAND Corporation report discussing high altitude airships and the powered balloon concept isn't mentioned, but the report does describe another system (pg 47). Suspend a wing and rudder 15 km below the balloon envelope and the difference in wind speed gives you energy to work with, the wing can now act like a sail and provide limited steering.

 

I'm honestly surprised I've never heard of the powered balloon program before, but doing a little Googling, I can find no indication this project ever continued beyond the one program or even the one flight. It's certainly didn't become common. And, there's no indication the Chinese balloon was equipped with such a system.  I still think it was limited to altitude changes for maneuvering.

If it flew over my house I wouldve taken a few shots! what round for chinese balloon?

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@Tailspin Turtle One of the comments I read over the last week was by a completive balloonist.  He was saying two of the competitions he did was who can get the farthest (as the crow flies) from their launch point during a timed session or who can land closest to a target on the ground several miles away.  At it simplest he was saying he'd just spit over the side of the balloon to figure out how the wind was blowing below him.

 

Due to domination of the jet stream on winter wind patterns I really don't think this was a planned surveillance flight over CONUS or if was planned, the path was not that important as the response to the incursion. There's just no real opportunity to maneuver with the jet stream low over the Midwest.  You get into summer weather with the jet stream up over Canada there's much more variability in the winds.

 

I've also been seeing reports (paywalled) today that NORAD isn't detecting these.  The US intelligence community is notifying the military.

 

2 minutes ago, DarkKnight said:

If it flew over my house I wouldve taken a few shots! what round for chinese balloon?

Good luck with that, what do you have that can reach 10+ miles up? ATF would probably like to chat. 

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7 minutes ago, Dave Williams said:


I’m sorry, but the Canadians don’t have the capability to shoot down something with a missile on their own?

Of course we do. We could use a Hornet, or get up to altitude with a helicopter and a pointy stick.

But that location is not too far from your F-22s. Its a NORAD scramble. Meaning both our countries. You were just closer. 

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19 minutes ago, Dave Williams said:


I’m sorry, but the Canadians don’t have the capability to shoot down something with a missile on their own?

I actually asked  this question tonight.  The answer I was given is that the F-22 has a higher service ceiling, and that's why they are being used.

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There will be many more kills on UAP's, balloons, or otherwise that y'all will be seeing in the future. Lotsa stuff floating/flying around up there. Some legit, some not. In the past, if they were not an imminent threat to safety they were mostly ignored. Not any longer. Everyone's looking for them now and they'll be going down. 

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Who will be the first US balloon ace since Frank Luke? It can happen!!!! I want to model that jet!!!

Can't shoot it down in International Waters unless it's an imminent threat to yourself or others. There are laws about that sort of thing. There are many reasons why the balloon wasn't taken out before hitting SC waters. A little quip I heard somewhere the other day explains it pretty well: "a little thought before the shot"!!!!

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