According to National Security Council spokesman John Kirby:
- Target is being described as a “high altitude object,” Kirby says “object” is the “best description we have right now”
- Confirmed to be unmanned
- Object was “Much smaller than the spy balloon we took down last Saturday” and has “no significant payload”
- Origin unknown
- Pentagon was tracking target over the past 24 hours
- Military determined the object posed a “reasonable threat” to aircraft due to its operational height, which has been described as 40,000 feet
- Object was shot down over US territorial waters and landed on an ice sheet
