comment: >
  
  Veteran storm chaser and disaster enthusiast.
  I basically keep an eye on most of the possible major natural disaster scenarios like the sun, geological activity, and general atmospheric conditions that might impact the continental US.
  I've been keeping an eye out for Tonga info since it happened and saw the Polar Stratospheric Clouds on Spaceweather.com which I check daily for current space weather conditions. They pretty much keep me updated on everything going on above the "normal" weather. 
  Honestly it is pretty wild how far my fascination with Texas severe weather has taken me... but even the major solar flares can enhance severe weather days so I keep an eye on it all.
context: “Why is the telescope pointed down”
  “…” >
  
  Because if it was pointed up, they’d just see the bottom of the balloon. >
  
  I think its time for the Canadians to send them some balloons in response
  Started has the balloon wars! >
  
  99 luftballons >
  
  red ones >
  
  Call Goldfinger >
  
  Well, that is an old one. Wasn't that the reason given about why the U2 that was shot down over the USSR with Francis Gary Powers was flying that day? >
  
  Also same reason USA gave for it balloon flights over USSR and PRC during cold war, when confronted about it. So they are just plain "oldie but goodie" excuse and also probably from China bit of "we haven't forgotten, that you used to do this to us". >
  
  Why would we believe anything they say? >
  
  It makes sense, doesn't it?
  Like who believes China would send a huge white balloon into the sky for everyone to see with the bare eye and use it for spying purpose? They have satellites to do that secretly. And the USA could take down the balloon any time they want. They simply chose not to do it.
  Another cheap spying option, like we have seen from Russia since the invasion in Ukraine started: There have been small drone sightings near military installations and military training grounds in Europe. In Norway they even caught operators.
  No one would use a huge white balloon in the sky. That's something for a Monty Python movie. >
  
  It's also 80000 to 100000..  feet up very not visible to the naked eye. It is visible to radar, but the jet stream hasn't changed much at all over the last month, they knew where it was heading.
  (our passenger jets fly about 36000 feet and are barely visible at cruising altitude) >
  
  It’s currently at 64,200 feet.  I’ve seen it as high as 67,000 on the Flightradar24 app. Passenger planes I’ve seen cruising anywhere between 35-45,000 feet. >
  
  I mentioned my source in my post, Flightradar24 app. >
  
  Could you provide I link, I highly doubt that this balloon has a transponder, are you sure you're not looking at something from project loon? >
  
  ~~flightradar24.com/***~~
  ~~It's the #1 tracked thing in the world atm via MLAT though.~~
  edit: Due to the reply, I'm not sure and removed the probably wrong link. >
  
  What a maroon … I bamboozled myself, lol. Appreciate your mythbusting on me. >
  
  Explained after they got caught? >
  
  I can't believe that thing is still in the air. >
  
  Normal citizens have no capability to take it down. >
  
  True, not normally. It seems there would be the type of people out there to figure out a way to do it. Perhaps not normal, but still civilians (non-official, non-police, non-military). >
  
  The only civilians that could do it are Bezos or Musk, for obvious reasons.  You must not comprehend just how high that is. >
  
  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Maybe. Or a not-so-regular macgyver. Perhaps a Felix Baumgartner type only with a different mindset. >
  
  NWS has there own balloons and the NWS doesn’t have balloons that big in the atmosphere. Plus the NWS balloons don’t go halfway around the world. >
  
  Also I have a feeling NWS doesn’t keep the data they collect a big secret and they could have easily got data from them if they just asked, or looked it up online… >
  
  But then the data would be in english, and I guess they probly wanted the data in Chinese. >
  
  If they’re being honest they would allow the US to down and it analyze its contents. >
  
  I mean it's in US airspace isn't it? Why wasn't it already shot down? God knows what the Chinese are up to
  Will there be diplomatic issues if US shoots it down? >
  
  I think the only reason is they don't want to threaten the lives of the people below if it turns out to be a bomb or something. >
  
  Already in the first reports about this balloon, it was stated falling debris is too dangerous, so it's not taken down.
  You don't need a bomb, a pebble is dangerous from that height. >
  
  Ok so let’s hit you with a pebble traveling at terminal so we can check the validity of their argument. >
  
  Sure, it'd probably hurt a little but I'd be fine.
  For reference a  1cm hailstone has a terminal velocity of only a bit over 15 miles per hour.
  There's a reason golfball sized hailstorms aren't mass casualty events >
  
  And if all the components on the instruments and solar panels were made of ice you’d almost have a point! >
  
  Are you under the impression things made of ice have a lower terminal velocity than everything else?...
  Also, weren't we talking about pebbles? >
  
  You realize we don't live in a vacuum, right? Terminal velocity is affected by drag, which is in turn affected by an object's density. You conveniently picked ice, which has an extremely low density, and thus lower drag. 
  The original comment you're contesting with tErMiNaL vEloCiTy! is
  
  Already in the first reports about this balloon, it was stated falling debris is too dangerous, so it's not taken down.
  
  The basis of your argument is effectively "well ice falling out of the sky doesn't hurt anyone, so fragments of metal won't either!" You know your argument sucks, so you're honing in on semantics of "how big is the pebble" and "what about ice!", knowing full well that metal debris falling from 60K feet can absolutely hurt someone.
  Furthermore, we can't control the weather (generally speaking), so the tolerance for hail falling on us that is caused by natural weather patterns is dramatically higher than the government having an F-22 slap  a giant balloon carrying metal components with an AIM-120 and cause the aftermath to fall all over your property. >
  
  I think a lot of folks are thinking that this is a spy balloon but the Chinese are saying it’s a weather balloon. I think that is obviously a very real possibility here. Just one question:
  What are the advantages of a balloon over a satellite? Satellites are certainly further away (duh) but with the cameras they have, they can pert near take a picture of a flea on a dog’s ass. Seeing as how china probably already has spy satellites flying over the US without incident, how detailed do they need the images to be that they’d be willing to risk the international kerfuffle? >
  
  I call bullshit. You do realize they are controlling its flight path dont you??? This thing has had a non-wind generated flight path. A satellita cannot stay on top of a land area for any length of time due to earth rotation and satellite geo-spatial alignment. They are video taping movement over nuclear silos and miltary bases in Montana.. China is gas lighting us. This is absolute spying. China would have told our govt .. Hey, we have a weather balloon flying over your air space please dont shoot it down.. But no they didnt.. If our govt doesnt shoot this thing down when it can safely and take control of it our govt is now China's bitch.. >
  
  ?
  A GEO satellite can stay over a fixed point for as long as it wants (has power and communications) >
  
  Yes geo-stationary can.. But lets think about this. Check all that have them.. China, Japan, Russia, US, UK have geo sats maybe a few others.. We all have some data on things... Lower atmosphere surveillance has its advantages, just like what we do for terrorism with planes and drones, but China cant do that over the US on a whim, but if its a "weather balloon" gone amuck.. Well all is just fine.and it just so happens to be over US areas they have bought properties in... Weather Satellites that are open source use for many countries can give them all they need for "weather". >
  
  Oh and it has been proven they are controlling it and its moving east now. >
  
  Ok 3 things
  1) if it is for weather purposes why would it be in a country other than your own
  2) as a weather device you would assume it had a GPS to verify location and weather data to help with whatever bs study they claim
  3) if it was lost why didn’t they say anything or do anything in the thousands of miles it to reach the US coastline. 
  This is obviously not a weather ballon and it’s a stupid excuse to use when you get caught. >
  
  
  
  Understanding the weather of your adversaries allows you to make better guesses as to things like crop yields. This could allow you to put compete them in the global markets. 
  
  
  Uh sure?
  
  
  Why bother? They don't care about our well-being. 
  
  
  It's probably sensing a whole lot more than the weather, so I think this is a "half" lie by them. 
  "Sure it's a weather balloon. Also 10 other things but yeah, weather." >
  
  My point is that there lie makes no sense at all. It’s a half assed lie, just like every other lie the Chinese make. >
  
  It makes a lot of sense if you understand that China is a dictatorship. >
  
  Why was it flying over a Montana missle base? >
  
  Just shoot it down already. It has no business being up there. If it was purely for scientific research they could have just asked. >
  
  riiiiight... and those islands you built in the South China Sea weren't for military uses... >
  
  Yet if it was a US baloon over China they'd be screaming bloody murder well into 2057. >
  
  If it was a balloon over China they would have televised shooting it down without a second's hesitation. >
  
  Disregarding anyone below it too. >
  
  Scientific reason or not. Get it shot down and destroyed. >
  
  Oh yeah. They just needed to know what the weather was like over the US and they forgot to pay the cable bill so they can't turn on The Weather Channel. >
  
  Let’s say it is meteorological why does china need more accurate information on air currents from Chinese mainland to U.S. the only thing I can think of is they are evaluating the amount of radiation that would head their way from a nuclear exchange. Do they know something we don’t? I doubt they would nuke us but maybe putin shared something in confidence with them. >
  
  In that case they would be more worried about radiation coming from Russia after US retaliates >
  
  Can’t we just shoot it down with those Jewish space lasers? >
  
  This is probably a stupid question…but is there a way for the US to capture and study tech attached to the balloon to see if China’s reasoning are true or not? It being in the US’s airspace makes it fair game, no? >
  
  Can we do balloon wars instead of betacuck Russia-style wars from now on? >
  
  They probably should have asked for permission if that were true. >
  
  Sure, espionage is part of political science >
  
  it's not but okay >
  
  Those Nuclear densiometers in the balloon are for weather surveillance >
  
  Bring that fucker down over the ocean and we’ll just see about that. >
  
  Who really believes the  CCP? >
  
  They could be telling the truth. Assuming that they're lying is just another form of trust. You trust that they're lying to you. >
  
  They are not telling the truth >
  
  I'm not saying they are. I don't have any reason to believe them.
  But do you have any evidence they're lying? >
  
  It wasn't a weather balloon >
  
  Have we found out what it is yet? >
  
  Did you read the story? I am guessing not >
  
  No. I'm waiting for a decent quality report on it. A day or two I assume. >
  
  So why was there no “heads up U.S. and Canada we lost our balloon”? >
  
  Of course it is, what else could it be, right?
  And that Russian boat off the cost of the US a few weeks ago was just studying marine animals. >
  
  Easy way for them to drop the seeds of invasive plants across the country. >
  
  100% looking at the effects of the Tonga volcano... they (China) have been in a severe drought ever since that thing blew and it's well know that volcanos change the climate temporarily due to stratospheric  changes.
  Volcanos emit actual tons of sulfur dioxide that turn into sulfuric acid in the stratosphere.  These microscopic droplets actually reflect radiation from the sun back into space and this loss of energy produces weather patterns changes that are poorly understood... this is where the term volcanic winter comes from. Volcanos that produce significant sulfur dioxide releases can cause temporary global cooling due to this sulfuric acid "shield" for 2-5 years post eruption. 
  1815 saw the eruption of Mt. Tambora that was responsible for the global cooling event known as "the year without summer." 
  Then there's the water droplets at all levels of the atmosphere that don't usually contain water... the polar regions have seen an explosion in very rare and very colorful polar stratospheric clouds. These are the most colorful clouds known and only show up a few days on a normal year... They have been a daily occurrence for the last few weeks... so there's definitely a lot of extra moisture in the stratosphere and or other abnormal conditions producing this rare phenomenon. 
  Basically the big Earth pimple yeeted actual tons of all sorts of things into low level orbit and the Chinese are probably trying to figure out how to make it rain in China again. >
  
  Did you type this as you did your research ? Was this something you already knew? Are you into volcanoes? Are you a meteorologist? 
  I have so many questions