Unknown Aerial Target Engaged Over Northern Michigan

On Sunday, 12 February 2023, as the larger part of America’s citizenry made ready to watch the Chiefs of Kansas City take on the Eagles of Philadelphia in a contest of football history will remember as Super Bowl LVII, an altogether darker matter of greater historical significance was playing out over Lake Huron, where the U.S. military shot down yet another, mysterious, high-altitude object.

U.S. officials alleged the object’s destruction was ordered by Joe Biden, who’s disinclination to bring down a Chinese spy balloon that traversed U.S. sovereign airspace between 28 January and 04 February 2023 has been broadly criticized by Capitol Hill lawmakers.

Sunday’s operation marked the third consecutive day in which America’s military was called upon to destroy unidentified objects transitioning U.S. airspace. On Saturday, 11 February, a reportedly cylindrical object operating at an altitude of FL400 was shot down over the approximate center of Canada’s Yukon Territory by an AIM-9X missile fired from a USAF F-22 Raptor fighter jet. On Friday, 10 February, an object White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby described as being roughly the size of a small car was similarly brought down by an AIM-9X missile fired from a USAF F-22.

Speaking to the subject of the Lake Huron object’s destruction, Representative Elissa Slotkin (Democrat, Michigan) stated the operation was carried out by pilots of the U.S. Air Force and National Guard.

“Great work by all who carried out this mission both in the air and back at headquarters. We’re all interested in exactly what this object was and its purpose,” Slotkin emoted in a tweet.

Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer set forth that she’d been in contact with U.S. federal officials following the incident, stating in a tweet: “Our national security and safety is always a top priority. I’ve been in contact with the federal government and our partners who were tracking an object near our airspace. I’m glad to report it has been swiftly, safely, and securely taken down.”

A senior White House official disclosed on 12 February that the latest mystery object had been flying at approximately FL200 over Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, and was nearing the shores of Lake Huron when it was neutralized. The unnamed official characterized the object as “octagonal” with trailing strings and no discernable payload. While no indication that the object possessed surveillance capabilities has yet been discerned, U.S. governmental, military, and intelligence agencies have not ruled out the possibility.

The Lake Huron object was initially detected by NORAD and NORTHCOM as it traversed Montana on Saturday night. Fighter aircraft were subsequently dispatched to investigate, but failed to identify any target correlative to the anomalous radar signatures detected by NORAD and NORTHCOM.

On Sunday, however, U.S. assets reacquired the anomalous radar contact overflying Wisconsin on an easterly heading—proceeding toward Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. The object, by dint of its course and altitude, was contradictorily determined to be of threat to civilian aircraft while posing no military threat to the United States or persons on the ground—so stated White House officials.

A senior White House official contended that the Lake Huron object, as well as the Canadian, and Alaskan mystery objects by which it was preceded, are not at all comparable to the Chinese spy balloon brought down off South Carolina’s Atlantic coast on 04 February.

“There is no sense they are anything but meteorological balloons or some sort of weather balloon, not spy balloons," the official equivocated.

In a subsequent, more plausible statement, NORAD reported the Lake Huron object had been brought down at 14:42 EST by a Sidewinder missile fired from an F-16 fighter jet.

“Its path and altitude raised concerns, including that it could be a hazard to civil aviation," NORAD declared. "The location chosen for this shoot down afforded us the opportunity to avoid impact to people on the ground while improving chances for debris recovery."

Collectively, the detection and destruction of four interloping aerial objects has fueled bipartisan calls for the White House and Pentagon to present Congress unambiguous data and accurate supplementary information pertaining to origins and purposes of the latest three mystery objects.

Notwithstanding Congress’s demands for transparency, White House officials have repudiated the notion of foreign aircraft overflying American airspace at will, claiming, rather, that the rise in sightings of unexplained aerial objects is attributable to the U.S. military’s heightened state of awareness.

Citing an abundance of vigilance in the wake of the Chinese spy balloon’s transcontinental crossing, a Biden administration official claimed: "Northern Command has adjusted the parameters of their radar capabilities in a way that they can see more than they could before.” The official added: "That's not to say they were blissfully ignorant before, but there are lots of things floating around and now we are more finely attuned to it."

Claims that similar objects of ostensibly Chinese origin regularly traversed the United States during the previous administration have been discredited by numerous Pentagon officials as well as former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, who headed up the U.S. Intelligence Community after serving three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives representing Texas’s Fourth Congressional District.

FMI: www.defense.gov, www.norad.mil