The silvery orb spotted over Billings that shut down air traffic and brought fighter jets, AWACS and air tankers to the area on Wednesday afternoon is suspected to be a Chinese spy balloon.
“The United States government has detected and is tracking a high-altitude surveillance balloon that is over the continental United States right now,” said Pentagon spokesperson Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder. “The U.S. government continues to track and monitor it closely.”
“Instances of this kind of balloon activity have been observed previously over the past several years," Ryder added. "Once the balloon was detected, the U.S. government acted immediately to protect against the collection of sensitive information.”
Word of something unusual in the skies over Billings first spread Wednesday afternoon when a "ground stop" was placed on regional airports, including Billings. No flights, including commercial air traffic, could land or depart in a 50-mile radius that included the Billings airport.
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Scrambled to the area were fighter jets, AWACS and two refueling air tankers, according to Gazette sources. AWACS are long-range radar surveillance aircraft.
Military aircraft form contrails as they circle an area southwest of Billings on Feb. 1.
According to sources, the balloon floated over the Aleutian Islands, over Canada and into U.S. airspace over Montana.
The U.S. has been tracking the suspected Chinese surveillance balloon for a couple days, but the Pentagon decided not to shoot it down due to risks of harm for people on the ground, officials told the AP Thursday.
A senior defense official told Pentagon reporters that the U.S. has “very high confidence” it is a Chinese high-altitude balloon and it was flying over sensitive sites to collect information, according to the AP. One of the places the balloon was spotted was Montana, which is home to one of the nation’s three nuclear missile silo fields at Malmstrom Air Force Base, the AP reported.
The defense official said the U.S. did get fighter jets, including F-22s, ready to shoot down the balloon if ordered to by the White House. The Pentagon ultimately recommended against it, noting that even as the balloon was over a sparsely populated area of Montana, its size would create a debris field large enough that it could have put people at risk.
In a letter sent Thursday to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., wrote: “The fact that this balloon was occupying Montana airspace creates significant concern that Malmstrom Air Force Base and the United States’ intercontinental ballistic missile fields are the target of this intelligence gathering mission. ... It is vital to establish the flight path of this balloon, any compromised U.S. national security assets, and all telecom or IT infrastructure on the ground within the U.S. that this spy balloon was utilizing.”
The defense official at the Pentagon said the spy balloon was trying to fly over the Montana missile fields, but the U.S. has assessed that it has “limited” value in terms of providing China intelligence it couldn’t already collect by other means, such through spy satellites.
A photograph of a large white balloon lingering over the area was captured by The Billings Gazette (above), but the Pentagon would not confirm if that was the surveillance balloon. The balloon could be seen drifting in and out of clouds and had what appeared to be a solar array hanging from the bottom, said Gazette photographer Larry Mayer.
The defense official said what concerned them about this launch was the altitude the balloon was flying at and the length of time it lingered over a location, without providing specifics.
At the Billings airport on Wednesday, the ground stop caused by the balloon delayed one flight and diverted two others.
Some Montana residents reported seeing an unusual object in the sky around the time of the airport shutdown Wednesday, but it’s not clear that what they were seeing was the balloon.
From an office window in Billings, Chase Doak said he saw a “big white circle in the sky” that he said was too small to be the moon.
He took some photos, then ran home to get a camera with a stronger lens and took more photos and video. He could see it for about 45 minutes and it appeared stationary, but Doak said the video suggested it was slowly moving.
“I thought maybe it was a legitimate UFO,” he said. “So I wanted to make sure I documented it and took as many photos as I could."
On Thursday, Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte issued a statement responding to the spy balloon.
“I received an informational briefing yesterday on the situation involving a suspected Chinese spy balloon flying over Montana. From the spy balloon to the Chinese Communist Party spying on Americans through TikTok to CCP-linked companies buying American farmland, I’m deeply troubled by the constant stream of alarming developments for our national security.”
Video shot by Chase Doak of Chinese spy satellite hovering over Billings Wednesday
Two of the U.S. Blue Angels land into the Edwards Jet Center in Billings.to promote an upcoming airshow.
