A NOAA air current model shows the China spy balloon is expected to traverse the United States heartland through the Midwest and Southern states on Friday before heading out to the Atlantic Ocean passing over the U.S. Navy base at Newport News, Virginia. Joe Biden refused to shoot down the balloon, however Secretary of State Antony Blinken cancelled a planned trip to Beijing in protest.
The NOAA HYSPLIT* model was used to reverse track the balloon from China. The balloon flew over the Aleutian Islands, then into Canada air space before crossing into U.S. airspace over Montana and a U.S. nuclear missile base on Wednesday.
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Forecasting shows it continuing across the U.S. on Friday:
The Pentagon has issued statements that downplayed the significance of the China spy balloon.
China issued a statement Friday morning regretting what it claimed is a civilian science experiment flying off course.
*”The Hybrid Single-Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory model (HYSPLIT)[1] is a computer model that is used to compute air parcel trajectories to determine how far and in what direction a parcel of air, and subsequently air pollutants, will travel. HYSPLIT is also capable of calculating air pollutant dispersion, chemical transformation, and deposition.[2] The HYSPLIT model was developed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Air Resources Laboratory and the Australian Bureau of Meteorology Research Centere in 1998.[3] The model derives its name from the usage of both Lagrangian and Eulerian approaches.” (Wikipedia)