Suspected spy balloons trigger UFO watch over Chicago skies

The saga of suspected Chinese spy balloons — or perhaps crafts visiting from much, much farther away — hovering in American airspace drifted closer to home over the weekend when federal aviation authorities temporarily closed air traffic over Lake Michigan so that fighter jets could shoot down a flying object.

The Federal Aviation Administration confirmed that it temporarily shut down airspace over Lake Michigan Sunday “to support Department of Defense activities.” The incident occurred around 1:42 p.m. Sunday when a Minnesota Air National Guard fighter pilot flying an F-16 fighter jet shot down the object over Lake Huron after it hovered around 20,000 feet, according to published reports. Authorities have not said what the object was.

Since the takedown of a suspected Chinese balloon in early February, the U.S. has shot down three other airborne objects, leading the White House Monday to tamp down on lighthearted public speculation about aliens and outer space.

“There is no — again, no — indication of aliens or extraterrestrial activity with these recent takedowns,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at the outset of a press briefing.

The weekslong succession of objects, starting with a giant white orb first detected over U.S. skies in late January, has puzzled American officials and stirred curiosity around the world. Though the three most recent objects differed in size, maneuverability and other characteristics from the suspected surveillance balloon shot down Feb. 4 off the South Carolina coast, officials moved to eliminate each one from the sky — actions that Pentagon officials believe have no peacetime precedent.

Indeed, instead of unexplained flying objects conjuring up feelings of whimsy and wonder at the prospect of contacting extraterrestrial life, it has stoked old Cold War fears that UFOs are instruments of war. Baby boomers in Chicago likely recall duck-and-cover drills with the widely reported knowledge that the city could be a target.

Chicago is one of six American cities likely to be hit by a nuclear attack, according to Columbia University professor Irwin Redlener, an expert in disaster preparedness.

But other experts, point to more innocent possibilities, such as wayward balloons that are commonly used by scientists and can indeed blow off course.

“There’s actually quite a lot of balloons that are released to the atmosphere on a daily basis,” said Geza Gyuk, Adler Planetarium’s director of astronomy. “The Weather Service sends up small balloons, complete with instrument packages dozens of times every day. … Balloons ending up in places where they weren’t expecting, too, are fairly common.”

The skies are constantly monitored, experts say. American airspace is the chief domain of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, who monitor both American airspace and outer space, scanning for threat to the Earth or American satellites.

University of Chicago theoretical physicist Robert Rosner suggested that the recent increase in UFO detection could be the result of adjustments made to track slow air objects.

“I think NORAD were probably a bit embarrassed for not having spotted (the suspected Chinese balloon) earlier. And that has to do with something that’s been discussed now publicly, which is that these radars are designed … to detect things that fly very quickly,” he said. “In other words, things like jet fighters, bombers and rockets, not necessarily things that move very, very slowly, and balloons move very, very slowly.”

Rosner explained that the radars were adjusted to detect slower-moving objects such as balloons and subsequently found more balloons. “So there’s a kind of a cause and effect here, namely that, you know, the discovery of the Chinese balloon caused the signal networks to find more of these things.”

Meanwhile, hours after the object was shot down over Lake Huron, social media came alive with reports of unexplained lights in the sky. Later, the aeronautic company SpaceX released a photo showing Starlink satellites launching into orbit.

“The vast majority of UFO sightings, meaning well over 90%, have always been explainable. And some of those things are secret projects, military craft; sometimes just misidentified planes that are just too far away to see,” said Mark Rodeghier, the longtime president and scientific director of the J. Allen Hynek Center for UFO Studies in Chicago.

Founded by the Chicago-born astrophysicist and former Ohio State University astronomer J. Allen Hynek in 1973, the center is a private nonprofit research organization that supports the study UFO and UAP (unidentified aerial phenomena) sightings and maintains a library and archives of UFO-related materials.

Rodeghier said American airspace is covered by NORAD and the FAA, but that lower flying objects likely evade security radars.

“Normal UFO sightings are localized and wouldn’t be picked up by defense radars. They could be picked up by FAA radars and they have been,” he said. “But not defense radars.”

Rodeghier echoed remarks made by State Department officials that low-flying balloons and drones can be present a hazard to speeding commercial airliners. The object shot down Sunday was low enough to be “definitely in the flight lanes,” able to collide with a commercial airliner, he said. “If you run into a balloon or (a flying object) that has some stuff on it like a package of instruments or something, sure, if you run into it at 400 miles per hour, that’s not good. They could be a danger to aviation.”

An acclaimed astronomer asked to consult the Air Force on UFOs, Hynek grew from a skeptic to someone who pushed for serious study and greater transparency by the government on UFO cases that remain unexplained. Hyenk wrote numerous books on the subject, including “Close Encounter,” which inspired Steven Spielberg’s movie “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.”

Rodeghier said he’s concerned that the political nature of the recent incidents will allow policymakers to shift the focus of UFO studies toward spying rather than sightings that could lead to greater discoveries.

“These incidents may make people, particularly decision-makers, say, ‘There is an unknown object problem and it’s (spy balloons), not (UFO) sightings over O’Hare,’” Rodeghier said. “Not all that interesting stuff that might be evidence of aliens visiting Earth. I hope what’s happening now doesn’t somehow take our eye off the ball.”

Rodeghier said the public should be aware of the flying object incidents, but not overly concerned until more is known.

“The public should be aware of it and following developments. I wouldn’t be worried about it yet. But why is China doing this now? That’s the question,” he said. “If it’s China and if they’ve ramped up their activities, why are they doing it now? That’s the unsettling part.”

The Associated Press contributed.