It was an eventful week for the US stratosphere, which saw an unwelcome intruder, and also bade farewell to an iconic aircraft
China’s surveillance tactics, recently covered in this magazine, seem to have gone low-tech. While sci-fi-grade, AI-equipped cameras spy on the Chinese populace, Beijing sent a hot-air balloon over the Pacific, and it was spotted in US airspace last week.
The US government claims it was a spy balloon whose presence clearly violates its sovereignty, while Beijing maintains its purpose was civilian and it was sent for scientific and meteorological purposes (I have a bridge to sell you). Some US airspace was temporarily closed before it was shot down on Shabbos.
The incident has further strained already-fraught US-Chinese relations; Secretary of State Antony Blinken postponed a planned trip to Beijing in response. Though it’s unclear exactly what information China hoped to obtain through the balloon, Americans have been unnerved by the ease with which an alien craft was able to enter US airspace. With an increasingly belligerent Beijing seeking to portray the US as a declining power, perhaps this was its main objective?
This week was a momentous one for the aviation industry, which said goodbye to the Boeing 747. The 1,574th and final one rolled off the assembly line on Tuesday. Even if you’re young enough never to have flown on a 747, chances are any long-haul flight you’ve flown on was aboard an aircraft following the first jumbo jet’s lead.
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