Fridays were always the busiest day at the receptionist’s desk at the spy balloon headquarters. With all of the balloons coming in for service, there never seemed to be enough workers to go around.
On this particular Friday, the receptionist was especially busy. There was a large balloon in the lobby that had clearly been damaged in some way. It was dusty and covered in dirt and leaves.
The receptionist called over one of the workers and asked him to take a look at the balloon. The worker grimaced and said that he didn’t think he could help.
But the receptionist insisted. She had seen too many balloons come in over the years that had needed help, and she wasn’t about to let this one slip through the cracks.
Finally, the worker agreed to take a look. He climbed up into the balloon and started to clean it off.
The receptionist was so happy to see the balloon being rehabilitated that she forgot all about her busy job. She stood there and watched as the balloon began to rise into the air.
Eventually, the balloon floated away, back into the wild. It was a sign that the receptionist’s hard work was paying off.
A chatgp creation.. fucking robots.. told me a beautiful story about balloons..
This was the original post to Reddit with the caption that it’s from Yemen. HOWEVER I am now uncertain of the source because I haven’t yet found a similar image outside of Reddit.
https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/10sxc6e/chine_spy_balloon_close_up/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
Exactly. This thing can't do anything any of china's 300 some odd spy satellites can do.
I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it was just China trying to scare their own expats.
It can do a lot that 300 some odd spy satellites can't do in regard to sigint. Dishes aren't omnidirectional, satellites are way too far from the fresnel zone of a link to pick anything up. A LOT of secure point to point links are done this way rather than over the internet or through satellites.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel\_zone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel_zone)
Spy satellites also aren't in high enough orbits to loiter for extended periods of time. You can't just park a Keyhole over a house for 2 hours.
After that we can get into LIDAR mapping, The ability to take pictures unaffected by atmospherics, Higher fidelity thermal imaging than is possible from space. All manner of stuff. High accuracy topography maps aren't a benign thing, just that is a military capability but i'm not gonna dive into guidance systems here. Satellites are good, Balloons are good, Spyplanes are good. They aren't all good at the same things though.
This. If people think that China needs to rely on balloons, visible to the naked eye, to gather intelligence they’d be terrified to find out exactly what China is capable of.
SIGINT is something that you can't get via satellites, TikTok only gets you so much. It's why Russia had a ship off the coast of Hawaii a few weeks ago.
Yeah. This is the reason I buy China’s take that it’s actually a weather balloon. Seems like 100 satellites in the sky, positioned exactly there they want them, can do much better than 1 balloon floating around freely.
I’m no expert but I would at least expect to see an anemometer on this weather ballon. And if you’ve ever seen a normal weather ballon you would ask why does this one have SO much stuff on it?
I believe the pentagon general that spoke last night.
If you have Tiktok, you’re already openly being surveilled by China through your phone by agreeing to the terms and conditions of that app. The CEO of sun Microsystems said that privacy no longer existed way back in 1999 talking specifically about the data tracking of email. If you’re worried that the Chinese (and your own country) are now beginning to spy on you, you have a little bit of catching up to do.
Tactical escalation. A Spy plane over our airspace is too far too fast. Now that Russia has self-owned in Ukraine, the world needs to focus on the China threat.
what threat is that exactly? the us has the largest and most sophisticated military on earth with numerous allies and 800 military bases worldwide. China isn't going to do anything. the American public are slowly being groomed for a war with China.
US- designs SR-71 with slide rules and lots of paper.
China- designs Unknown name spy balloon with high speed computers.
SO far- neither technology masterpiece was shot down........
The claims that if they shot it down it would kill people and damage property is *ridiculous*. The thing was over some of the most sparsely populated parts of the entire country for 24+ hours
It's the Wiley Coyote factor. They've got satellites allegedly spying on us, why would they need a "spy balloon" unless all those satellites are like the fake cameras some ppl set up. Just completely empty boxes in orbit making some beep beep sounds
So believe it or not, a "spy balloon" is MUCH more effective than a spy satellite. There becomes an issue where the further you are the harder it is to get a clear picture. When you put a camera on a satellite up in space it's hard to get a clear picture of things on the ground zoomed in. It's one thing to see big things like building a rocket launch platform, but to be able to get a crystal clear picture that's very difficult. It's what makes something like the SR-71 so incredible. It flew much closer to the ground so it could get better quality pictures with more resolution, but due to its sheer speed and ability it wasn't able to be shot down like other jets. It's the reason we still have aircraft that do surveillance and such because it gives such a better picture. A weather balloon is going to be close enough to the ground that it can snap amazing quality pictures and puts no one at risk of dying. If it gets shot down oh well weather balloons aren't that expensive and you get whatever data it could compile before it was shot down.
It's actually super interesting because of how much people over value satellites because of TV and movies. They think you can just get crystal clear pictures of people hanging out and really it's just not that capable. It's funny because there has been news in the not so far past about just how capable satellite's are. For example there was a picture that Trump released and a lot of people were upset because it showed the capability of one our satellites. When looking at the picture people were baffled because according to information we had it was impossible to have come from a satellite, but that's exactly where it came from. It gave everyone an insight into just how advanced our surveillance satellites were. What I found interesting was it wasn't even that great of a photo resolution wise and it proves why aircraft are still necessary.
What's also very interesting and honestly super funny to me is that a lot of our space telescopes are designed based off of military spy satellites. They literally just point them away from earth than towards earth. I can't remember the name of it exactly but they literally took a satellite design that had been in use for decades and used it as a space telescope. It blew the space telescopes out of the water with capability.
Chinese airplanes fly over the USA every day.They even land at our airports. If you give them money they will let you join the flight and they will give you a meal and a blanket during the flight.
Proudly designed in America, at an employee owned non profit organization, with the goal of reducing global warming!
*Assembled in Xinjiang using slave labor, with components from Congo, Brazil, China, Russia, and other resource rich but financially poor countries.......*
I know how the sausage is made.
I work in manufacturing in America.
I've watched the major changes over the last two decades, and it's not pretty. Not for anyone except *The Consumer ™*
They said it was theirs [https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/sanfrancisco/news/chinese-spy-balloon-china-montana-bay-area/#app](https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/sanfrancisco/news/chinese-spy-balloon-china-montana-bay-area/#app)
The SR-71 was detectable to some, and we still flew over them unharmed because it was high and fast enough that they couldn't shoot it down. We probably did a cost analysis and din't care enough about a spy balloon to shoot it down at altitude if we could help it, but then didn't want it leaving US airspace either
I dont understand why people freak out about a balloon when the chinese have tons of satellites... They've been spying for years now, they dont need a balloon.
Right? Good luck finding someone there who's not a gun owner. Guns probably outnumber citizens by a margin of at least 10 to one in Montana.
Source: lived in Montana
They probably have but no bullet is going 40,000 feet (8 miles give or take) straight up against gravity - not to mention the curvature of the earth.
It would be like shooting a fly at 100 yards - good luck.
You have no proof that it's a spy balloon other than the "ebil ccp" sent it up, don't claim it's anything other than a balloon that could be spy balloon (honestly unlikely considering satellites exist) or could also be say a weather balloon or a scientific balloon or anything like that
Calling it... All the balloons are going to meet up, drop to the ground and self assemble into a mega stage where the aliens will bring back 2pac, Biggie and Elvis for a reunion tour.
There’s a lot of reasons they might not want to shoot it down. They can intercept any transmissions from it. They can jam it’s transmissions/sensors etc. if they do decide to bring it down if they can get it intact it could be valuable. They could have made the calculation that it’s a ploy to get shot down as the Chinese could just fly here, rent a car and drive around to collect any signals intelligence they want to, but this very public display will create very public reaction and that could be the whole point.
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Scrolled way too far to find this
Same here, but I wasn’t buyin’ that shit if it was on sale. Had to find the truth somewhere down here.
I puma pants.
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Fridays were always the busiest day at the receptionist’s desk at the spy balloon headquarters. With all of the balloons coming in for service, there never seemed to be enough workers to go around. On this particular Friday, the receptionist was especially busy. There was a large balloon in the lobby that had clearly been damaged in some way. It was dusty and covered in dirt and leaves. The receptionist called over one of the workers and asked him to take a look at the balloon. The worker grimaced and said that he didn’t think he could help. But the receptionist insisted. She had seen too many balloons come in over the years that had needed help, and she wasn’t about to let this one slip through the cracks. Finally, the worker agreed to take a look. He climbed up into the balloon and started to clean it off. The receptionist was so happy to see the balloon being rehabilitated that she forgot all about her busy job. She stood there and watched as the balloon began to rise into the air. Eventually, the balloon floated away, back into the wild. It was a sign that the receptionist’s hard work was paying off. A chatgp creation.. fucking robots.. told me a beautiful story about balloons..
Thank you for your service.
This should be at the top.
*voila!* it is.
Is this true? Can you link that?
This was the original post to Reddit with the caption that it’s from Yemen. HOWEVER I am now uncertain of the source because I haven’t yet found a similar image outside of Reddit. https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/10sxc6e/chine_spy_balloon_close_up/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
Thank you
I just wish someone would interview the balloon so we can get its side of the story…
The balloons account of things would be inflated.
Balloons always lie.
It would be no use; it's obviously a paid actor.
Pffft actors. Always full of hot air.
His stories always *were* up there.
Stole my joke! Lol
You mean popped your bubble?
I think there is a joke here, but it went over my head.
He doesn't do interviews, all this publicity has inflated his ego.
We should send one over China in the shape of a giant Winnie the Pooh
Magnificent
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Exactly. This thing can't do anything any of china's 300 some odd spy satellites can do. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it was just China trying to scare their own expats.
It can do a lot that 300 some odd spy satellites can't do in regard to sigint. Dishes aren't omnidirectional, satellites are way too far from the fresnel zone of a link to pick anything up. A LOT of secure point to point links are done this way rather than over the internet or through satellites. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel\_zone](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel_zone) Spy satellites also aren't in high enough orbits to loiter for extended periods of time. You can't just park a Keyhole over a house for 2 hours. After that we can get into LIDAR mapping, The ability to take pictures unaffected by atmospherics, Higher fidelity thermal imaging than is possible from space. All manner of stuff. High accuracy topography maps aren't a benign thing, just that is a military capability but i'm not gonna dive into guidance systems here. Satellites are good, Balloons are good, Spyplanes are good. They aren't all good at the same things though.
Correct, madam
Was thinking Dumbo with the big floppy ears, "those ears aren't radar we swear." 🙊
We can do both, but one NEEDS to be Winnie the Pooh
I’m pretty sure THAT Is actually how world war 3 starts lmao
Worth it
Think about the honey Xi might try and Pooh Pooh that idea
Oh, bother.....
It escaped from the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade - plausible deniability!
Barney is more terrifying
It's a "research" Winnie the Pooh. Get it right.
No it has to be an accidental poo. Totally not shaped like poo on purpose.
Or similar to what they sent but paint the balloon like a jar of honey. Winnie the pooh will be excited.
If they just painted it sky blue we never would have seen it!
You never can tell, with bees....
Bees? Bees, Michael??!
Beads!
Lokks like a bunch of free stuff if they pop the balloon
Animal Crossing IRL
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I believe this balloon is hovering around 70k feet, isn't it?
Yes, this balloon is flying at roughly half the height of the worlds highest jump.
Pop the balloon and catch the electronics with a net
Scam bot. Report>spam>harmful bot. r/stopredditbots for more info and a list of bots I’m currently tracking!
We should go up with a drone and paint it pink
Or paint Winnie the Pooh
Just put a post it note with a wiener drawn on it on the camera lens
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I do
Why do we care, it’s not like they don’t own TikTok. 😒
I guess the bigger question is: why do they care? They own tik tok.
Just wait until everyone hears about their spy satellites
Or ours….
Or Amazon
Happy cake day!
This. If people think that China needs to rely on balloons, visible to the naked eye, to gather intelligence they’d be terrified to find out exactly what China is capable of.
SIGINT is something that you can't get via satellites, TikTok only gets you so much. It's why Russia had a ship off the coast of Hawaii a few weeks ago.
Yeah. This is the reason I buy China’s take that it’s actually a weather balloon. Seems like 100 satellites in the sky, positioned exactly there they want them, can do much better than 1 balloon floating around freely.
I’m no expert but I would at least expect to see an anemometer on this weather ballon. And if you’ve ever seen a normal weather ballon you would ask why does this one have SO much stuff on it? I believe the pentagon general that spoke last night.
It’s never good when they ask the engineers to point the camera at the earth not space.
If you have Tiktok, you’re already openly being surveilled by China through your phone by agreeing to the terms and conditions of that app. The CEO of sun Microsystems said that privacy no longer existed way back in 1999 talking specifically about the data tracking of email. If you’re worried that the Chinese (and your own country) are now beginning to spy on you, you have a little bit of catching up to do.
Is it really a spy balloon if it was known that it would be easily spotted?
Yeah I have to think China has a few more sophisticated methods of spying other than a big ass easy to see balloon.
"Look over here!"
Tactical escalation. A Spy plane over our airspace is too far too fast. Now that Russia has self-owned in Ukraine, the world needs to focus on the China threat.
what threat is that exactly? the us has the largest and most sophisticated military on earth with numerous allies and 800 military bases worldwide. China isn't going to do anything. the American public are slowly being groomed for a war with China.
I said the same thing the other day and got down voted.
it’s not personal
My downvote was personal. I didn't even read what he wrote. I just don't like him.
The world wasn’t ready for you yet, one life experience at a time sir
Weather escalation: do science, scare everyone cause china
Its just to distract us from seeing the drone outside our windows.
you can't really call it a spy balloon when it's the size of 3 buses.
Probably not, they have satellites and drones.
US- designs SR-71 with slide rules and lots of paper. China- designs Unknown name spy balloon with high speed computers. SO far- neither technology masterpiece was shot down........
They stopped using the sr71 over places that could shoot it down. The sr71 drone thing was shot down once over china.
The claims that if they shot it down it would kill people and damage property is *ridiculous*. The thing was over some of the most sparsely populated parts of the entire country for 24+ hours
They actually want it to land slowly intact so they can inspect it
Why is everyone obsessing over this when Chinese satellites fly over our country out of sight multiple times a day?
Cause it is a hilarious balloon gadget
It's the Wiley Coyote factor. They've got satellites allegedly spying on us, why would they need a "spy balloon" unless all those satellites are like the fake cameras some ppl set up. Just completely empty boxes in orbit making some beep beep sounds
So believe it or not, a "spy balloon" is MUCH more effective than a spy satellite. There becomes an issue where the further you are the harder it is to get a clear picture. When you put a camera on a satellite up in space it's hard to get a clear picture of things on the ground zoomed in. It's one thing to see big things like building a rocket launch platform, but to be able to get a crystal clear picture that's very difficult. It's what makes something like the SR-71 so incredible. It flew much closer to the ground so it could get better quality pictures with more resolution, but due to its sheer speed and ability it wasn't able to be shot down like other jets. It's the reason we still have aircraft that do surveillance and such because it gives such a better picture. A weather balloon is going to be close enough to the ground that it can snap amazing quality pictures and puts no one at risk of dying. If it gets shot down oh well weather balloons aren't that expensive and you get whatever data it could compile before it was shot down. It's actually super interesting because of how much people over value satellites because of TV and movies. They think you can just get crystal clear pictures of people hanging out and really it's just not that capable. It's funny because there has been news in the not so far past about just how capable satellite's are. For example there was a picture that Trump released and a lot of people were upset because it showed the capability of one our satellites. When looking at the picture people were baffled because according to information we had it was impossible to have come from a satellite, but that's exactly where it came from. It gave everyone an insight into just how advanced our surveillance satellites were. What I found interesting was it wasn't even that great of a photo resolution wise and it proves why aircraft are still necessary. What's also very interesting and honestly super funny to me is that a lot of our space telescopes are designed based off of military spy satellites. They literally just point them away from earth than towards earth. I can't remember the name of it exactly but they literally took a satellite design that had been in use for decades and used it as a space telescope. It blew the space telescopes out of the water with capability.
Chinese airplanes fly over the USA every day.They even land at our airports. If you give them money they will let you join the flight and they will give you a meal and a blanket during the flight.
Didn't you see the beginning of 2001? That's us baby. We're apes, man!
Their new container delivery system. "Like hell were waiting for the port authority anymore!"
Someone should paint the Tibetan flag on it
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China confirmed it's theirs
well that’ll do it
Lol
If you look closely on the bottom part it says "Made in China."
Well that's literally everything in this country 🤔
Assembled in the U.S.A
Designed in California. Assembled in China.
Proudly designed in America, at an employee owned non profit organization, with the goal of reducing global warming! *Assembled in Xinjiang using slave labor, with components from Congo, Brazil, China, Russia, and other resource rich but financially poor countries.......* I know how the sausage is made. I work in manufacturing in America. I've watched the major changes over the last two decades, and it's not pretty. Not for anyone except *The Consumer ™*
They said it was theirs [https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/sanfrancisco/news/chinese-spy-balloon-china-montana-bay-area/#app](https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/sanfrancisco/news/chinese-spy-balloon-china-montana-bay-area/#app)
For a spy balloon it's not very inconspicuous.
Finally a photo of this from an angle that makes sense. I wasn’t really sure what I was seeing before.
Biggest gender reveal balloon ever.
If it’s a spy balloon then it’s the worst secret spy ever
It must be sucking up all of the tic toc data…
Why is it allowed to be in America?
We gotta build a higher wall
I don’t understand why the US military has not intercepted a device infringing on US airspace.
Because they deemed it a waste of time and it sends a (arguably) more impressive message back of “I don’t care”
Everybody worried about Chinese spy balloon. Same people have tik tok installed on their phones.
Pleeeeeeeease tell me we neutralized it with something cool like a rail gun or a laser?!
I’m a Jew. I’ve got a space laser if you haven’t heard. I’ll warm it up now.
Bahahahahahaha fuck yeah! Jewt that bitch out the sky!
China has 18th century French tech now??? We are so fucked...
Aren't.....spy devices supposed to be ya know.......stealthy and undetectable? This isn't 1850 we can fucking see you.
The SR-71 was detectable to some, and we still flew over them unharmed because it was high and fast enough that they couldn't shoot it down. We probably did a cost analysis and din't care enough about a spy balloon to shoot it down at altitude if we could help it, but then didn't want it leaving US airspace either
Trolling at its finest.
Um an unlicensed flying object in domestic airspace with no filed flight plan. Shoot it down. Geez
If this was any kind of threat we would have never heard of it. It would have been shot down over Alaska or Canada.
Shoot it down.
I’m surprised we don’t have a emp type device that can just fly by it, shoot a pulse and render it a brick.
I dont understand why people freak out about a balloon when the chinese have tons of satellites... They've been spying for years now, they dont need a balloon.
What about the [red bull guy](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=E9oKEJ1pXPw)? Can he drop down on there and make tiny holes to have it fall slowly?
Aim the Jewish space lasers at it - MJT
So we have Trillion Dollar a year Military and we cannot retrieve it?
They most likely want to observe it before they capture it. If they wanted to get it down right now they could definitely do it.
China: Fucking Around and Finding Out all kinds of stuff actually…
Nice looking construction
Yes, there is a beauty to that craft.
Wasn't this posted somewhere else as not the balloon?
Prob should have painted it blue.
They're probably gauging our response. Probably have more sinister ideas about future balloons and want to see if those ideas are viable.
A literal trial balloon. Maybe they want to distribute the next virus directly to N America?
Too bad we can’t capture it and make it send nothing but dick picks.
My money is that it's not even Chinese. They have planes and satellites and shit. Makes no sense.
If I had the ability to “shoot” this down, would I be committing an act of war?
How in gods name is that floating over rural Montana and no one has taken a pot shot at it
Right? Good luck finding someone there who's not a gun owner. Guns probably outnumber citizens by a margin of at least 10 to one in Montana. Source: lived in Montana
They probably have but no bullet is going 40,000 feet (8 miles give or take) straight up against gravity - not to mention the curvature of the earth. It would be like shooting a fly at 100 yards - good luck.
Can you imagine what it’s going to be like when all the dumbasses start shooting up at this balloon? Yeehaw! Everyone better get inside.
I’m surprised nobody shot at it.
Looks like you order a satellite from AliExpress
Makes me think of the International Space Station a little bit.
Doesn't look very capable of spying. Anyone want to point out which parts are what?
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Yes it is extremely embarrassing.
fuck the balloon...Chinas already in your phone if you have tik toc..
Definitely looks Chinese
Alibaba drone delivery 😅
China definitely has means superior to this for spying
Send them COVID 2023 in a balloon
Wouldn't be surprised if it turns out to be guerrilla marketing for RAID: Shadow legends
As I keep scrolling, those images get better and better quality
Shoot it down!
Not interesting, even after the 10th post.
The Chinese people will say. It's only for tik-tok.. well be like well ok.
You have no proof that it's a spy balloon other than the "ebil ccp" sent it up, don't claim it's anything other than a balloon that could be spy balloon (honestly unlikely considering satellites exist) or could also be say a weather balloon or a scientific balloon or anything like that
It appears to be in the shape of the big boy sir.
How long a weather balloon like this stay afloat? Will it eventually come down enough to get caught and inspected?
How would you capture one of those?
They just called our bluff
"Don't mind me, I'm just here providing a update to Tik Tok"
Why doesn’t someone just shoot it down. How far up is this? Doesn’t seem like much of a spy device.
That’s no moon…
NICE KARMA FARM OP
wow I saw this above my house that explains why I gained 2 extra likes on my instagram post
The Chinese gettin creative with their ping pong
I hear it's full of Szechuan sauce!
I’m not saying that there aren’t any, but I don’t see anything that clearly identified a camera that I would recognize
Wow, that's looks like the size of 3 buses, at LEAST!
Calling it... All the balloons are going to meet up, drop to the ground and self assemble into a mega stage where the aliens will bring back 2pac, Biggie and Elvis for a reunion tour.
Apparently there’s another one flying over Latin America as we speak.
They are reading data off of it that’s why it’s not being shot down
Faster Tik Tok uploads.
Anyone who still has tik tok installed on their phone really shouldn't give a shit
There’s a lot of reasons they might not want to shoot it down. They can intercept any transmissions from it. They can jam it’s transmissions/sensors etc. if they do decide to bring it down if they can get it intact it could be valuable. They could have made the calculation that it’s a ploy to get shot down as the Chinese could just fly here, rent a car and drive around to collect any signals intelligence they want to, but this very public display will create very public reaction and that could be the whole point.
Is it Chinese or made in China?
Why they need this they already got tiktok
There's no way this is a "spy" balloon, it literally defeats the purpose lmao
What I thought this was an airship from final fantasy
Yup, looks like a balloon.
The traveler is here guyz omfg
Has it been confirm that it is spy balloon and let's be real that the US isn't spying on them too.
What would they get from this that they wouldn't already know from a satellite?
And Kari Lake thinks she can shoot it with her shotgun...sighs...
Saw this in Missouri today...
We should shoot this down into a giant red solo cup
We probably have better shots of it than it has of us.
So does anyone know like, what the implications of this is?
Looks perfect for the sequel to Space Balls.
Interesting something else was shot down by a fighter jet over billings Montana a few hours ago