Chinese spy balloon hovering over Montana

#2,326
#2,326
I don't know if its a misprint but apparently two sidewinders missed the target over Lake Huron.
 
#2,328
#2,328
#2,334
#2,334
#2,335
#2,335
Why can’t we just put a few rounds through a balloon so it doesn’t explode and the remains don’t have a vapor trail cashing to earth destroying most evidence? A missile seems like a bit overkill and waste of money.
 
  • Like
Reactions: InVOLuntary
#2,336
#2,336
C-south said:
Why can’t we just put a few rounds through a balloon so it doesn’t explode and the remains don’t have a vapor trail cashing to earth destroying most evidence? A missile seems like a bit overkill and waste of money.
Click to expand...

Bullets have to come down somewhere. But I do agree, why the hell can't we just shoot and dart (inert missile with a self destruct) at them?
 
#2,337
#2,337
C-south said:
Why can’t we just put a few rounds through a balloon so it doesn’t explode and the remains don’t have a vapor trail cashing to earth destroying most evidence? A missile seems like a bit overkill and waste of money.
Click to expand...
Especially when you miss…
 
#2,339
#2,339
Makes me wonder if this pilot had completed all of his DoD assigned readings.

How do you miss a balloon the size of a school bus.
 
  • Like
Reactions: hog88
#2,342
#2,342
I believe the latest block of the AIM-9X is picture infrared (don't quote me on that).

Joint chiefs of staff Mark Milley said there was one missile at the bottom of Lake Huron.
 
#2,343
#2,343
hog88 said:
IDK, have they been around for years?
Click to expand...
Yeah, it’s popped up in the news here and there. I remember reading an in-depth piece on wired I think a year or two ago but can’t find it. Our military has had similar projects at least as far back as Palladium in the early Cold War. UAPs have probably become more of a problem in recent years with increasingly cheap drone technology.

It seems these objects are mostly probing radar defenses. They’re different sizes, shapes, speed, altitudes, etc. We can’t just shoot them all down, because that will still give the enemy the data they seek. So we have to be selective about when and where we shoot them, try and feed them false information, etc. I’m sure it’s an intelligence dance of sorts that’s gone on for a long time.

I think PKT gave the obvious answer to my question. The reason it’s a big deal now is because China’s yuge balloon could be spotted with the naked eye, made the news, and went viral. It was sort of public knowledge before but now it’s front-page news so officials have to address it. But that begs the follow up question: why was that balloon so big and at such low altitude that it could be spotted? That’s not an effective way to spy or test radar capabilities. Was it a technical error? Or is it a troll of sorts?
 
  • Like
Reactions: PKT_VOL
#2,347
#2,347
85SugarVol said:
We missed a shot on a balloon? A floating balloon…
Click to expand...

Apparently it's not that easy. Think of stabbing jelly with a fork rather than stabbing a tire with a nail. If they used a flammable substance rather than something inert, it would be a different thing, but apparently you can put a lot of holes in a balloon like this and it will take a long time to come down - it just doesn't pop and isn't flammable. As far as missiles go, they have to have something to home on and something to cause detonation otherwise they can just put bigger holes in the balloon and keep going ... and that's a problem in itself. That also brings up the point about what the missiles actually hit and how much of intelligence value is left because the stuff hanging under the balloons is maybe a better target for a missile. Could be that first hit off the coast was actually debris from the warhead and stuff under the balloon ripping it up rather than the missile destroying the balloon itself. We'll probably never know for sure - somebody else might.

My brother and I were talking about some of this last night. They got a request one time while on alert to take down a weather balloon. He didn't know the outcome but the request was to shoot it down with guns, and their F-106s on alert didn't have guns, so they didn't intercept it. He said there was something about nearby F-4s with guns, but they couldn't get to the necessary altitude - not sure why not; it was about 50,000 ft.
 
  • Like
Reactions: DuckInAPen
#2,348
#2,348
AM64 said:
Apparently it's not that easy. Think of stabbing jelly with a fork rather than stabbing a tire with a nail. If they used a flammable substance rather than something inert, it would be a different thing, but apparently you can put a lot of holes in a balloon like this and it will take a long time to come down - it just doesn't pop and isn't flammable. As far as missiles go, they have to have something to home on and something to cause detonation otherwise they can just put bigger holes in the balloon and keep going ... and that's a problem in itself. That also brings up the point about what the missiles actually hit and how much of intelligence value is left because the stuff hanging under the balloons is maybe a better target for a missile. Could be that first hit off the coast was actually debris from the warhead and stuff under the balloon ripping it up rather than the missile destroying the balloon itself. We'll probably never know for sure - somebody else might.

My brother and I were talking about some of this last night. They got a request one time while on alert to take down a weather balloon. He didn't know the outcome but the request was to shoot it down with guns, and their F-106s on alert didn't have guns, so they didn't intercept it. He said there was something about nearby F-4s with guns, but they couldn't get to the necessary altitude - not sure why not; it was about 50,000 ft.
Click to expand...
It’s a balloon (size of a school bus I hear).
Should have been able to take it out with a shoulder fired Stinger, from an adjacent balloon..
 
#2,349
#2,349
Anybody come forward claiming some research balloons? I guess we’ve reach a critical point of research balloons cause traffic issues.
 
  • Like
Reactions: AM64
#2,350
#2,350
85SugarVol said:
It’s a balloon (size of a school bus I hear).
Should have been able to take it out with a shoulder fired Stinger, from an adjacent balloon..
Click to expand...

So if you could hit it with a Stinger, what makes the Stinger go boom? There's basically no resistance, so it just passes through without enough impact to cause the warhead to detonate. Then all you have is a huge gas bag with a lot of helium (you'd guess) leaking and slowly losing altitude until things started to equalize at lower altitudes and the sink rate would likely be even less. Big helium balloons look half deflated when they are launched - it's not a matter of how inflated the gas bag is but how much buoyancy the enclosed gas has in relation to the atmosphere it displaces. If there's not a huge differential pressure, deflation is going to be very slow. It's not just aiming at a huge basically stationary target; missiles are designed to track a target according to parameters a big gas bag doesn't have and with fusing to detect a hit or near proximity to an object with parameters a gas bag doesn't have either. Fill a gas bag with hydrogen, use tracers, and it's a whole different ball game.
 
  • Like
Reactions: InVOLuntary, 85SugarVol and DuckInAPen
New posts
You must log in or register to reply here.

VN Store



Back
Top