U.S. officials said that less than a week after the military shot down a Chinese balloon, a U.S. F-22 fighter jet shot down a "high-altitude object" over Alaska.

According to Reuters, Pentagon Press Secretary Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder said the object "roughly the size of a small car" was shot down over the northwestern state of Alaska near Deadhorse on Friday.

Ryder noted that the object, which entered U.S. airspace on Thursday night, was brought down using an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile fired from the jet on the order of President Joe Biden.

"We don't know who owns this object," White House spokesperson John Kirby told reporters when asked where the object came from. Kirby noted that many details about the "high-altitude object" were unknown.

On February 4, the U.S. shot down a Chinese spy balloon off the coast of South Carolina. The balloon stayed above the U.S. for a week before President Joe Biden decided to shoot it down. 

China claimed that the balloon was just a weather research "airship" that was blown off course, which the Pentagon has rejected. The Pentagon also rejected China's contention that the balloon was a civilian device not being used for surveillance and had limited navigational ability.

Biden's alleged hesitation to shoot it down on its first reporting earned criticisms. Leon Panetta, a former defense secretary in the Obama administration, previously said he believed the U.S. should have taken steps to prevent the balloon from entering its territory if it was a Chinese spy balloon.

However, Biden explained his delay in shooting down the surveillance craft, saying that military officials told him to wait until they had "the safest place to do it." The president also requested that the military should shoot it down in a way that would allow them to recover its payload.

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'High-Altitude Object' Over Alaska Poses Threat to Civilian Flights' Safety

According to John Kirby, Joe Biden had ordered the military to shoot down the "high-altitude object" out of an abundance of caution and at the recommendation of the Pentagon.

He said the unidentified object, flying at 40,000 feet, posed a reasonable threat to the safety of civilian flights. BBC reported that commercial airplanes can fly as high as 45,000 feet.

Kirby noted that fighter aircraft first checked if it "was manned," and the "pilots' assessment was that this was not manned," ABC News reported.

"It was virtually at the whim of the wind," he said. A U.S. official told ABC News that the object was a "cylindrical and silver-ish gray," "balloon-like." 

"It came in, inside our territorial waters, those waters right now are frozen, but inside territorial airspace and over territorial waters. Fighter aircraft assigned to U.S. Northern Command took down the object within the last hour," Kirby noted.

U.S. Authorities Collect Debris From Unknown 'High-Altitude Object' for Analysis

John Kirby noted that the object landed on frozen waters of the Beaufort Sea, which could make it easier to recover debris. Helicopters and transport aircraft have already been deployed to collect the debris.

So far, Patrick Ryder said a significant amount of debris had been recovered and loaded onto vessels to be taken to "labs for subsequent analysis."

U.S. officials have yet to determine whether the object was involved in surveillance. According to the White House, there was no other objects of a threatening nature have been identified above the U.S. at this time.

"We're going to remain vigilant about our airspace. The president takes his obligations to protect our national security interests as paramount," Kirby noted.

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Written by: Bert Hoover

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