Based on what we spend in Ukrain we should have used the starwars defense stuff on it just for praactice.
Dont recall altitude bring reported but 1000 rounds would mean 3 aircraft or attempts by the same aircraft. In the missile age, cannons are not much more than an a "just in case" and what does one practice on air to air?
Carbureted engine, would never make it...but it'd look really cool, if it could. A2a combat nowadays has to be the most expensive version of laser tag...
watch Top Gun 'Maverick' ... you'll see how they practice air to air dog fighting .... great movie, up for 6 Academy awards .....
For those of you with a much better understanding of electronics, encryption, high end surveillance equipment, data storage and transmission-----was there any benefit to the United States to continue to allow the balloon to move across the US? Like IT counter surveillance.....
According to the military, yes. If they find enough debris, they can put that up against their in the air assessment. The balloon most likely did not show them anything they have not seen with their satellites. They already know where our hard assets are. It is simply a matter of timing to move any soft asset we don't want seen. And we had days to do it unlike satellite passes.
If escorted and transmissions jammed the entire trip, theoretically, it's possible little harm/transmission may have occurred...pending on transmission technology... Solar array...at least 8 panels on each side...at least 16 panels, assuming 300w panels, may aid some assumptions (E.g. Maybe not using Satellite/laser for any sustained comm). It also looked like the missle hit the payload, not the balloon...the vid of the pilot also mentioned something like 'metallic chaf' after...so literally, putting the pieces back together will be the mother of all jigsaw puzzles.
I'm kind of thinking about gathering data and storage info remotely. Breaking into its IT as it was airborn... Thoughts on that?
IMHO, unlikely. I doubt it was a (continuously) 'connected device', these aren't everyday encounters (as far as I know). Likely easier to target comm...
