By 
February 14th, 2023
Image credit:
20th Century Fox
It has been a bunch of busy days for identified and unidentified flying objects scooting across Canadian and U.S. territory, and other locations too.
After that sky-high saga of a purported Chinese spy balloon being shot down off the coast of South Carolina, the follow-up acts involve the U.S. military downing three unidentified flying objects over Alaska, Canada and Michigan.
Statista, a major provider of market and consumer data, offers some looks at all the high-altitude anxiety about what’s going down in the skies above.
Image credit: Statista
“And while U.S. officials are still figuring out what the flying objects shot down on the weekend were and what purpose they served, unidentified flying objects, or unidentified aerial phenomena, as they are officially called, are not as rare as one might think,” explains Statista’s Felix Richter.
Meteorological equipment?
According to public information collected by open-source intelligence accounts, that Chinese balloon likely made its way across the states of Wyoming, South Dakota, Nebraska and Kentucky, says Katharina Buchholz, a Statista Data Journalist.
“It is less likely but also possible that it traveled across Colorado, Iowa or Georgia. Due to the weather on location as well as the very high altitude that the balloon was traveling at – 50,000 to 70,000 feet compared to an airplane at usually 30,000-40,000 feet – it was not always spotted,” Buchholz explains.
It remains unclear what led to the balloon’s voyage across the United States, with Chinese officials stating that the balloon’s journey was an accident and that is was in fact a piece of meteorological equipment.
Image credit: USNI News
Testing capabilities and reactions?
“Theories to what the balloon could have been doing over the country include China testing U.S. counter-surveillance capabilities and reactions,” Buchholz adds.
Citing ANI and Nikkei Asia as sources, Buccholz says that, through the balloon’s flight, China could have found out how fast military and intelligence sources detect intrusions into U.S. airspace and also how speedy the response.
“The second part of this tactic could also include a psychological component,” Buchholz says. “Chinese military planes are also known to repeatedly intrude into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone, soliciting reactions from Taiwan. Russian also has a long history of similar behavior of fighter planes around NATO countries.”
Image credit: Statista
Detected and destroyed
“As our chart shows, three more objects have since been detected and destroyed,” adds Statista’s Anna Fleck.
“These have all been smaller than the giant balloon and are reported to have different characteristics. According to officials, the object on Feb. 10 flew without any kind of propulsion or control system, while the object on Feb. 11 was described as cylindrical in shape and about the size of a Volkswagen Beetle. The fourth object, shot down yesterday over Lake Huron, was reportedly octagonal and had strings attached to it. It is currently unknown where the latest three objects originated from or what they were designed to do.”
Fleck writes that the series of incidents has also raised the question of whether more objects are indeed flying over the U.S. than usual.
Perhaps more are simply being identified and scrutinized, since the U.S. air defense altered their radar systems after the balloon’s detection to also detect smaller and slower-moving objects, Fleck adds. “Either way, regardless of the intention behind their creation, having objects flying at altitude is a clear flight hazard.”
Image credit: Statista
Balloons, drones…and?
There’s a lot going on in the sky, according to data from the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence, observes Matthias Brandt, also a Data Journalist for Statista.
“According to them, over 350 flying objects were sighted over the USA from March 2021 to August 2022,” Brandt notes.
“Of these, 163 were initially classified as balloons or balloon-like,” writes Brandt. “Another 26 sightings could be due to drones. However, no initial classification was possible for almost half of the aerial phenomena.”
Alien hysteria
Meanwhile, Richter has looked into public attitudes concerning unidentified flying objects (UFOs) and extraterrestrial visits.
“The fact that General Glen VanHerck, commander of U.S. Northern Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), refused to “rule out anything” when asked if extraterrestrials could be involved in the latest incidents didn’t exactly help stifle the budding alien hysteria,” Richter suggests.
Image credit: Statista
Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre did her best to calm everybody down in a White House press briefing on Monday, Richter adds, with Jean-Pierre saying that “there is no — again, no indication of aliens or extraterrestrial activity with these recent takedowns. And it was important for us to say that from here because we’ve been hearing a lot about it.”
Poll results
Looking at the results of an Ipsos poll conducted across 36 countries in late 2022, Richter points out that it doesn’t come as a surprise that the latest incidents involving unidentified flying objects sparked some lively speculation online.
When asked whether or not they think it’s likely that aliens would visit Earth in 2023, an average of 18 percent of respondents said that they considered extraterrestrial visitors a likely scenario for 2023. Respondents from India and China were particularly open-minded when it comes to alien visitors, while people in Great Britain and Japan were among the largest skeptics, Richter writes.
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