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[Telgin]

I've seen people talking about how it should have been shot down days ago, somewhere over Alaska.  So, yes, there's that angle at the very least.

[King Zultan]

Why don't they just pop it and be done with it? Are they worried that China is gonna start crying about their balloon like a child or something?

[Lord Shonus]

They did - it was shot down over open ocean. Primary reason not to shoot it down before then was that engaging at that altitude risked spreading debris at random over a huge chunk of potentially-populated US and Canada - once it was over water, debris ceased to be an issue.

[scriver]

Whyd they'd have to shoot it down though? Couldn't they just reach out the window and grab it while they passed?

[Akura]

It was at 60,000 feet, according to the very first Google response. Most commercial planes fly much lower than that.

[Frumple]

Cheaper to shoot down than fly up, more or less, yeah.

[King Zultan]

Primary reason not to shoot it down before then was that engaging at that altitude risked spreading debris at random over a huge chunk of potentially-populated US and Canada

But it's a balloon I don't see how it'd be that big a deal to pop it over the land, were they worried it'd be filled with anthrax or something?

[Lord Shonus]

Primary reason not to shoot it down before then was that engaging at that altitude risked spreading debris at random over a huge chunk of potentially-populated US and Canada

But it's a balloon I don't see how it'd be that big a deal to pop it over the land, were they worried it'd be filled with anthrax or something?

What exactly do you think they would shoot it down with? You have to use cannon shells (which spread over a large area and potentially cause damage and casualties to civilians on the ground) or missiles (which explode, sending shrapnel in every direction, potentially causing casualties and damage to civilians on the ground). Not to mention that the thing had some pretty substantial electronics hanging from it, which have to go somewhere after being shot down. You can not be certain where that debris will go - if there's even a single civilian in the potential damage area (which might not even be your own civilian - the potential damage area for big parts of the balloon's flight included southern Canada), you have to assume that civilian will get smoked. That's a reasonable risk to take against an attack aircraft, but this was a spy platform. Nothing it could hear and transmit before hitting the ocean (where you can put up a big "Nobody's allowed in here right now, if you get killed while trespassing it is your own damn fault" declaration) justifies even property damage.

A 20mm cannon shell or fragment of a continuous-rod warhead is far heavier than a penny, and absolutely will injure or kill you if it comes crashing down on you from 60,000 feet. If you look at WWII pictures of AA men or air wardens (the chaps who went around making sure blackout rules were enforced and helping people to bomb shelters), they all wear helmets. That's not to protect against bombs from the enemy - it is to protect against debris from friendly AA shells.

[scriver]

I shoot balloons with my bb gun all the time back on Tattooine

[McTraveller]

While the "don't shoot while over land to prevent damage to people on the ground" is a silly argument (I'm more likely to accept "we're more likely to have recoverable wreckage if it's taken down over water"), I find it silly that people think it's a poor show of force to let the balloon fly over.

I think it's a stronger show of force to let it ride the wind: "Eh whatever, even if you learn what you learn, it doesn't matter. Go ahead."

Sometimes not responding rashly is a greater sign of strength than "going in swinging punches."

[None]

...Why is that a silly argument? The thing was the size of two buses. Say it fell on someone's house, or car chunks larger than a golf ball exploded off the main body of equipment, or the aforementioned 20mm shell or missile broke into pieces, or the balloon crushed a car, and the miles of red tape it would take to get the pieces (all of the pieces) while Roger Roughneck is waving a gun around about the feds being on his property.

Edit: Or takes down a power line and subsequently catches fire...

[McTraveller]

It's silly because of just how much of the US is actually just uninhabited wilderness.  I mean, randomly drop a school bus on the continental US and compute the odds of it hitting anything.  Now drop it not randomly, trying to avoid hitting anything - even if you get something like 10 miles of drift due to winds aloft.  I mean falling with a "slow" terminal velocity of 100mph is about 150ft/second, or 9000 feet per minute. 

This means even from 60000ft it would only take about 7 minutes to hit the ground, call it 0.1 hours.  Even if you had 100mph winds aloft the whole way down, that's a drift of only about 10 miles.

There are many, many places in the US where you have 400 square miles (20 miles x 20 miles) that are basically empty, drop it down in one of those.

Thus the assertion: It's a silly argument.

[Magmacube_tr]

I liked it.

It went booooooooooooom

[EuchreJack]

Why don't they just pop it and be done with it? Are they worried that China is gonna start crying about their balloon like a child or something?

China did just that, LOL.

[Magmacube_tr]

Why don't they just pop it and be done with it? Are they worried that China is gonna start crying about their balloon like a child or something?

China did just that, LOL.

Now we will never hear the end of their whining!