The Chinese spy balloon which was shot down by the United States reportedly gathered intelligence on US military sites.
NBC News, quoting senior US officials reported that the Chinese balloon that flew across the United States was able to gather intelligence from several US military sites. The report, citing two current senior US officials and one former senior administration official said the spy balloon was able to make multiple passes over some of the sites in February, at times flying in a figure-eight formation.
"The intelligence China collected was mostly from electronic signals, which can be picked up from weapons systems or include communications from base personnel, rather than images," the publication reported quoting a senior official.
The spy balloon which Beijing claimed was being used for weather monitoring flew over the United States and Canada for over a week early in February before being shot down off the Atlantic Coast
on President Joe Biden's orders. The balloon incident strained US-China relations and it prompted US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to postpone a planned visit to Beijing.
The downed balloon was roughly 200 feet tall and carried a payload weighing more than a couple of thousand pounds.
