• Hello, please take a minute to check out our awesome content, contributed by the wonderful members of our community. We hope you'll add your own thoughts and opinions by making a free account!

Tracking the Balloons o Doom

Hey peeps before it even goes this way can we keep this to tracking the actual location of the balloon and its life cycle.

I'll just go ahead and say it we don't need to know where you stand politically on this or how you think it makes the country look. I can give you political access if you want to discuss that
 
My assumption is if they do try a take down over the ATL later today a NOTAM will be posted. Based on
Twitter Obs, roughly a Waynesville to Shelby line over the past couple hours, should be visible in the CLT metro now.
 
US official to ABC: We will try to shoot down the Chinese airship over the Atlantic Ocean. "We will recover the wreckage of the Chinese airship after it is shot down."
 
I'm noticing air traffic off the NC coast has dropped off precipitously over the past hour, to the point where it's non-existent. A lot of times flights from the northeast to FL fly out over the ATL, all that traffic is now just inland. A USCG C-130 is doing laps just off ILM, and two KC-135Rs are also now in that area.

You can see this flight to Calgary changing course a short time ago.

Screen Shot 2023-02-04 at 12.29.50 PM.png
 
Intel Crab is saying it's likely an F-15, which has a ceiling of about 65K', my guess is they will probably use the 20mm gun to shred the balloon and bring what it's carrying down intact, vs a air to air missile, ie no explosion, just a somewhat controlled decent to keep what it is carrying as much in tact as possible.
 
WeatherNC said:
Intel Crab is saying it's likely an F-15, which has a ceiling of about 65K', my guess is they will probably use the 20mm gun to shred the balloon and bring what it's carrying down intact, vs a air to air missile, ie no explosion, just a somewhat controlled decent to keep what it is carrying as much in tact as possible.
Click to expand...
The 2 USAF planes showing on Flight tracker is a KC46 Pegasus Off NC Coast and a KC 135 off Myrtle beach.. both are tankers..
 
Seeing Navy Grumman C-2 Greyhound entering picture, part of debris collection?
 
metwannabe said:
Seeing Navy Grumman C-2 Greyhound entering picture, part of debris collection?
Click to expand...
That's usually a cargo aircraft, I saw that the USS Carter Hall is in route to the area, currently just east of ILM, it's a landing dock with a large crane and left the port at MHX this morning.

 
WeatherNC said:
That's usually a cargo aircraft, I saw that the USS Carter Hall is in route to the area, currently just east of ILM, it's a landing dock with a large crane and left the port at MHX this morning.

Click to expand...

How close these fighter jets have to get to it to hit with those 20mm?
 
metwannabe said:
How close these fighter jets have to get to it to hit with those 20mm?
Click to expand...

Usually under a couple thousand meters, they can lob them a little further. I'm pretty sure the HUD gives a crosshair that accounts for aircraft pitch. Now a fighter traveling at say 400kts, that's a pretty short firing window.
 
metwannabe said:
Am I incorrect but that looked more like a missile that took it down
Click to expand...
It was hard to tell, but it did look like a clear takedown. The payload immediately detached and began to free fall, not great for collection efforts. Fox is reporting a missile.
 
metwannabe said:
I'm incorrect haha, seen better video, clearly fighter jet shooting it down with the 20mm
Click to expand...
Well I don't know what the heck I'm talking about.... now saying it might have been a missile. Interesting tactic if true, as ncweather said not good for collection efforts
 
metwannabe said:
Well I don't know what the heck I'm talking about.... now saying it might have been a missile. Interesting tactic if true, as ncweather said not good for collection efforts
Click to expand...
Do 20 mm rounds leave contrails when fired at 60k feet? This video on Twitter sure makes it look like a missile. However, more of a kinetic hit than explosion.

 
metwannabe said:
Well I don't know what the heck I'm talking about.... now saying it might have been a missile. Interesting tactic if true, as ncweather said not good for collection efforts
Click to expand...
They don't want to collect it. There could have been many non-populated areas over which to shoot it down. They already have the story going about how it's probably going to sink and how the salt water will likely ruin any chance to get anything meaningful from it.

How do they know it's Chinese?

How do they know it's a spy balloon?

How are we not able to detect aircraft until they are already over the US?

Why do we not want to retrieve it or get anything useful from it?

Why is launching a balloon whose trajectory is subject to random weather patterns the most efficient way for China to spy on us in 2023?

Why would we let it traverse the whole country of the United States/How do we know it wouldn't be dangerous to the US?

This is ridiculous.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top