WASHINGTON, D.C. (KELO) — Officials confirmed they are currently not tracking any additional objects, while they’re still trying to get their hands on the ones on the ground.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken postponed his visit to the country in response.
“There is no indication of aliens or extraterrestrial activity with these recent takedowns,” said Karine Jean-Pierre, White House Press Secretary.
The White House ruled out one possibility Monday around the mystery of multiple unidentified objects that fighter jets recently shot down over U.S. and Canadian airspace.
John Kirby with the National Security Council says crews are now working to recover the debris.
“The objects in Alaska and Canada are in pretty remote terrain, ice and wilderness, all of that making it difficult to find them,” Kirby said.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin says U.S. officials determined the objects were not a security threat to people on the ground, but were flying low enough to potentially disrupt civilian air travel.
“We don’t know if they were actually collecting intelligence,” Austin said.
Kirby says the objects were not manned or transmitting communication signals and the U.S. is currently not tracking any others.
“You want to err on the side of safety here in terms of protecting our national security interests,” Kirby said.
Officials say the repeated shootdowns reflect a “heightened alert” following the Chinese spy balloon that crossed through U.S. airspace last month.
“There is no question in our minds that that system was designed to surveil,” Kirby said.
And even though China maintains its innocence, officials now accuse the U.S. of sending its own surveillance balloons over their territory.
“We are not flying surveillance balloons over China,” Kirby said.
And Secretary of State Antony Blinken postponed his planned trip to the country in response. Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has fighter pilots based out of Duluth shot down one of the unidentified objects over Lake Huron on Sunday.
