The U.S. shooting down of what Washington says was a Chinese spy balloon and Beijing says was a civilian scientific vessel accidentally blown off course has fuelled widespread questions, including about the balloon itself.
U.S. officials said they had been tracking the high-altitude for some time and that it drifted over the United States for at least seven days.and had limited self-steering ability. It said it was affected by the weather and unexpectedly drifted into U.S. airspace.
"Photographic payloads may be carried by larger balloons, but wouldn't even be a third of the size of the balloon that flew over the country." By looks and by size, it resembles balloons made by U.S. firm Aerostar, whose own balloon was mistaken for the Chinese one while flying over Memphis. China does not appear to have a private company equivalent, but the official Chinese Academy of Sciences' Aerospace Information Research Institute and Institute of Optoelectronics have both conducted significant research on stratospheric balloons and published accounts of launches.
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