US Northern Command said Friday it has recommended ending the search for debris from two objects shot down in United States airspace this month.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin endorsed the recommendation, the command said in a statement. The end of recovery efforts could mean the country will never know what the objects really were, how they were propelled and where they came from.
The findings apply to aerial objects shot down by US fighter jets on February 10 near Deadhorse, Alaska, off the coast of Michigan, and on February 12 over Lake Huron.
The command said, “The US military, federal agencies and Canadian partners conducted a systematic search of each area using a variety of capabilities, including airborne imagery and sensors, surface sensors and observations, and subsurface scans, and did not locate the wreckage. “
Efforts in Deadhour were hampered by arctic conditions and sea ice instability, it said.
The recommendation does not include the February 4 shot by what the United States described as a Chinese spy balloon off the coast of South Carolina.
Military officials said the recovery efforts in the Atlantic, which ended Thursday, were successful, and the recovered items were taken to an FBI laboratory “for counterintelligence exploitation,” according to the statement Friday.
The command said that the airspace and maritime boundary around all the three recovery operations have been lifted.
Another incident involving the takedown of an aerial object occurred on 11 February in Canadian airspace and is under the jurisdiction of the Canadian authorities.
The Biden administration announced Monday that it is forming an interagency group to address the recent cluster and future unidentified objects.
President Joe Biden made comments about the objects on Thursday, playing down the possibility that non-balloon objects could also be linked to surveillance efforts.
In public remarks, Biden said, “We don’t yet know exactly what these three objects were, but nothing suggests right now that they were related to China’s spy balloon program, or that they were surveillance vehicles from another country.” Were.”
Kurt Chirbas Contribution,
