Yeah, this HN headline might be based on a game of telephone from this quote (from [0]):
> "We’re calling them objects for a reason. Certainly, the event off the South Carolina coast for the Chinese spy balloon, that was clearly a balloon," he said. "These are objects. I am not able to categorize how they stay aloft. It could be a gaseous type of balloon inside a structure, or it could be some type of a propulsion system. But clearly they’re able to stay aloft."
Does anyone track all the legit weather balloons? I feel like pretty soon now someone is going to realize there are hundreds or thousands of innocuous civilian owned objects that the Pentagon doesn't have real-time knowledge of and shooting them down willy-nilly is going to make for a big brouhaha.
> Pentagon: Unknown objects not balloons, unsure of sustained flight method
People of Earth, your attention, please. This is Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz of the Galactic Hyperspace Planning Council. As you will no doubt be aware, the plans for development of the outlying regions of the Galaxy require the building of a hyperspatial express route through your star system. And regrettably, your planet is one of those scheduled for demolition. The process will take slightly less than two of your Earth minutes. Thank you. ..
It seems like what’s happening is the pentagon has a really specific definition of what a balloon is and is a little tone deaf when it comes to making statements normal people read.
Are these craft held aloft by closed containers of lighter than air gas? Very little uncertainty there. Are they straight up weather balloon style big stretchy polymer and nothing else? No. Are they somewhere else on the spectrum of various kind of structure around the lifting gas? Yup. Can you tell what kind from afar or after you’ve blown it up? Not so easily. Can you tell what kind or if they have any propulsion after you’ve blown them up especially over large bodies of water? Not so easily.
Really bad PR is what got us Roswell because nobody had the mind to just explain these things, somewhat embarrassing public image but i guess I’m ok with the military being bad at this kind of thing because being good at it is kind of a threat to everyone.
Someone clever and independent needs to be in charge of handling this whole project but I’m afraid we’re just going to keep getting “F-22 victory vs balloonish thing, we have no idea what it was”
This would be a really good opportunity to embarrass China which really gets you negotiating power with them, but that opportunity is being squandered. Capture one and put it on the nightly news, maybe with some nice prominent Chinese lettering on the hardware. The story needs to be “China is violating our airspace in the stupidest possible way, it’s so lame we’re not at risk but please stop you’re embarrassing yourself”
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[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 35.4 ms ] thread> "We’re calling them objects for a reason. Certainly, the event off the South Carolina coast for the Chinese spy balloon, that was clearly a balloon," he said. "These are objects. I am not able to categorize how they stay aloft. It could be a gaseous type of balloon inside a structure, or it could be some type of a propulsion system. But clearly they’re able to stay aloft."
[0]: https://www.foxnews.com/us/us-heightened-alert-increasing-sc...
People of Earth, your attention, please. This is Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz of the Galactic Hyperspace Planning Council. As you will no doubt be aware, the plans for development of the outlying regions of the Galaxy require the building of a hyperspatial express route through your star system. And regrettably, your planet is one of those scheduled for demolition. The process will take slightly less than two of your Earth minutes. Thank you. ..
Are these craft held aloft by closed containers of lighter than air gas? Very little uncertainty there. Are they straight up weather balloon style big stretchy polymer and nothing else? No. Are they somewhere else on the spectrum of various kind of structure around the lifting gas? Yup. Can you tell what kind from afar or after you’ve blown it up? Not so easily. Can you tell what kind or if they have any propulsion after you’ve blown them up especially over large bodies of water? Not so easily.
Really bad PR is what got us Roswell because nobody had the mind to just explain these things, somewhat embarrassing public image but i guess I’m ok with the military being bad at this kind of thing because being good at it is kind of a threat to everyone.
Someone clever and independent needs to be in charge of handling this whole project but I’m afraid we’re just going to keep getting “F-22 victory vs balloonish thing, we have no idea what it was”
This would be a really good opportunity to embarrass China which really gets you negotiating power with them, but that opportunity is being squandered. Capture one and put it on the nightly news, maybe with some nice prominent Chinese lettering on the hardware. The story needs to be “China is violating our airspace in the stupidest possible way, it’s so lame we’re not at risk but please stop you’re embarrassing yourself”