Alaska High-Altitude Object — F-22 Shootdown

On February 10, 2023, NORAD radar detected an unidentified object at approximately 40,000 feet over the Beaufort Sea off the northern coast of Alaska — operating at altitudes used by commercial aviation. The object was traveling at roughly 20 to 40 miles per hour, far slower than the Chinese stratospheric surveillance balloon that US forces had shot down over the Atlantic Ocean just three days earlier on February 4. A pair of F-22 Raptors from the 3rd Wing at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson was scrambled to intercept.

The F-22 pilot who made visual contact described the object as cylindrical or octagonal in shape, with no visible wings, no discernible means of propulsion, no markings, and no observable payload configuration. An AIM-9X Sidewinder missile was fired, downing the object over frozen terrain near Deadhorse, Alaska, on the North Slope. Recovery operations were launched but complicated by extreme arctic cold, poor visibility, and the remoteness of the impact zone.

President Biden was briefed on the engagement in real time. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby subsequently confirmed that three additional unidentified aerial objects had been shot down by US and Canadian forces in the days immediately following: the Alaska object on February 10, a second object over Canada's Yukon Territory on February 11, and a third over Lake Huron, Michigan on February 12. All three engagements were conducted under NORAD authority. None of the three objects was ever publicly attributed to any state actor, non-state actor, or commercial entity. No recovered debris from any of the three objects has been publicly described in sufficient detail to establish the objects' origin, purpose, construction, or function.

The Biden administration's eventual position — that the three objects were 'likely benign civilian entities' — was received with deep skepticism by national security analysts and Congressional members who had been briefed on the classified details. The episode raised acute questions about the frequency of unidentified aerial objects operating in US-monitored airspace, the government's criteria for engagement, and the capacity or willingness of the executive branch to publicly characterize what its own military had shot down over American and allied territory.