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Pictures of a high-altitude, long-endurance airship sighted near the Philippine island of Luzon emerging on social media have raised speculation of Beijing’s military surveillance and reconnaissance mission in the South China Sea region.
Residents of several towns in Pangasinan located on the Philippine island of Luzon took to social media Sunday to report the sighting of the unusual flying object hovering in the sky.
While the sighting has led to wide speculation about the origin and purpose of the airship, a report in The War Zone said the airship appeared similar in design to a number of stratospheric airship types that Chinese companies are known to have been working on.
Given China’s strategic interest in the South China Sea which has led to friction and disputes with other countries in the region, it is not surprising if Beijing uses an airship for military surveillance missions.
Earlier reports based on satellite images have indicated that China has deployed an operational airship in the disputed region, to strengthen its military reconnaissance ability in the South China Sea.
While stratospheric airships fly higher than regular fighter aircraft, their shape and slow speed also make it hard for traditional radars to track and intercept them, enabling airships to pass over areas unopposed to collect surveillance data.
At least two of China’s uncrewed solar-powered airships — the Tian Heng and Yuan Meng — have external propulsion and other systems meant for operations at stratospheric altitudes, the War Zone report said.
While the status of the airship projects itself is unclear, the War Zone said in a 2021 report that, based on several satellite images, a huge airship hangar located south of Bosten Lake in China’s Xinjiang Autonomous Region had grown significantly since it was first constructed in 2013.
Significantly, China has in May flown an airship at a record altitude as part of its study of the environment above Mount Everest to record atmosphere composition data.
Meanwhile, the War Zone report also notes that the possibility of the airship belonging to other countries cannot be ruled out. For instance, the U.S. military has also had an interest in stratospheric airship operations.
However, Lockheed Martin’s High-Altitude Long Endurance-Demonstrator (HALE-D), which appears to have a shape similar to the one seen in the images from Pangasinan, crashed during its first test flight conducted in 2011. Meanwhile, subsequent U.S. projects that sought to build on the work of HALE-D reportedly ended in 2014.
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