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Taiwan military releases photo of Chinese weather balloon debris

ROC Central News Agency

Photo courtesy of the MND

02/19/2023 10:53 AM

Taipei, Feb. 19 (CNA) Taiwan's military on Saturday night made public a photograph of the wreckage of a suspected Chinese weather balloon found on one of its offshore frontline islets near China on Thursday, saying it had concluded the device did not have audio or video recording capabilities.

In a press release, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said the balloon debris found by military personnel on Dongyin islet, part of the Matsu archipelago governed by Lienchiang County in the Republic of China (Taiwan), consisted of an antenna, temperature and humidity sensors, a lithium battery, and a data transmitter.

The balloon, however, did not contain audio/video recording or storage equipment, it said.

According to the MND, its investigation concluded that the device is likely a radiosonde: a battery-powered telemetry instrument carried into the atmosphere usually by a weather balloon that measures various atmospheric parameters and transmits them by radio to a ground receiver.

The MND added that similar equipment has been found by the military on a regular basis, most often between the months of December and February, in the air and seas around Taiwan.

The press release also came with a photograph of the debris of the balloon, which was not made public when the military said it was first found on Thursday morning.

The Army's Dongyin Area Command said it found the wreckage around 11 a.m. Thursday at a shooting range of the command located on the islet, which is about 40 km from China's Fujian Province and is one of the closest Taiwan-controlled territories to China.

The suspected balloon has a one-meter diameter and the simplified Chinese characters "Taiyuan No. 1 Radio Factory," "GTS13 Radiosonde" and "Meteorological Instrument" written on it.

Taiwan uses traditional Chinese characters, while simplified characters are used in China.

Taiyuan No. 1 Radio Factory is based in Taiyuan City, the capital of Shanxi Province, and manufactures mechanical and weather instruments, according to information available online.

The balloon wreckage was found after Taiwan's military said early last week that that Chinese balloons detected in Taiwan's airspace to date have been weather balloons and did not pose a security threat that would require them to be shot down.

(By Joseph Yeh)

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