Britain considers buying its own spy balloons as interest grows after Chinese device flies over US
7 March 2023, 09:43
Britain is looking into buying its own fleet of spy balloons, it has emerged - weeks after the Chinese flew one over America.
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A £100m research deal was signed last year to develop "stratospheric uncrewed air systems" for the Ministry of Defence.
Public interest in surveillance balloons has been piqued after a Chinese balloon – which Beijing insisted was a weather device that got blown off-course – flew over the US.
The device was seen over nuclear missile silos in Montana but officials waited until it flew to the Atlantic Ocean before shooting it down, fearing the impact of falling debris.
The incident sparked a row between the US and China and triggered a spate of shoot-downs of other unidentified objects in the sky – but all three had no connection to the Chinese armed forces.
Under Project Aether, Britain has been looking into the development of surveillance devices with the Sierra Nevada Corporation, which is running test flights, and the MoD has confirmed its interest in "balloon-based" equipment, the Times said.
Balloons can travel as high as 80,000ft – above jet fighters and even the high altitude U2 spy plane developed during the Cold War.
That means they are less likely to get battered by turbulence.
Read more: Pentagon releases close-up photo of Chinese spy balloon one day before it was shot down
Ross Corbet, who is part of the MoD's procurement and future capabilities group, said: "Successfully exploiting this space could mean huge potential benefits but there's still a lot left for us to learn about how to operate there, especially for long periods of time.
"Our working theory is that the turbulence we've all experienced in aeroplanes cruising at 40,000ft doesn't exist to the same degree in the stratosphere.
"If that's right, we could send up really light aircraft for long periods of time, without worrying about them being battered by turbulent air. This could be a layer of the atmosphere with, we think, very little traffic or weather."
He said the MoD is looking at both balloons and fixed-wing capabilities.
Read more: China’s balloon incursion ‘must never happen again’, says US
A spokesman for the MoD said: "We regularly keep our capabilities under review and while assessment activity is ongoing it would be inappropriate to comment further."
The US claims 40 countries on five continents have been spied on with China's balloons, and there is evidence they have been used in ten instances across the Americas.
America has a classified programme for balloons called Cold Star, and tested 25 devices in 2019.
