Military: Balloon recently spotted off Hawaii not a threat

The U.S. military tracked an unidentified balloon transiting through Hawaii’s airspace over the weekend, but have so far determined that the object poses no threat either to civilian aircraft or national security.

The Federal Aviation Administration and the military detected the balloon on Friday moving off the coast of Hawaii floating at about 36,000 feet a Department of Defense spokesperson told the Star-Advertiser Monday.

“Ownership of the balloon is unknown, but there is no indication that it was maneuvering or being controlled by a foreign or adversarial actor,” said the spokesperson. “The balloon did not transit directly over defense critical infrastructure or other U.S. Government sensitive sites, nor did it pose a military or physical threat to people on the ground.”

Earlier this year the Air Force shot down a large Chinese balloon that American officials say was a spy balloon, but that Beijing insists was a weather balloon. An F-22 jet shot it down off the coast of South Carolina in February after it had transited the U.S. and Canada and flown over several key military installations.

After shooting down the balloon, the U.S. and Canadian militaries shot down several other unidentified flying objects over Alaska and Canada. At the time officials said they did not know what those objects were. The White House now says some appear to have been either small weather balloons or balloons put in the air by hobbyists and were unlikely to belong to a foreign power.

The military has since adopted new parameters for monitoring U.S. airspace. The DOD spokesperson said that although the balloon spotted this weekend was flying at an elevation used by civil aviation, it didn’t pose any immediate threat to aircraft flying over Hawaii.

“Based on these observations, the Secretary of Defense concurred with the recommendation of his military commanders that no action need be taken against the balloon.” said the spokesperson. “The balloon is now out of Hawaii’s airspace and territorial waters. We will continue to track the balloon with the FAA.”