By Steve Scherer and Katharine Jackson

OTTAWA/WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Canadian investigators are attempting to find the wreckage of the mysterious flying object shot down by a U.S. fighter jet over Yukon territory, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stated Sunday, because the U.S. Senate’s high lawmaker stated that it – and one other flying object shot down off the coast of Alaska – each gave the impression to be balloons.

“Restoration groups are on the bottom, seeking to discover and analyze the item,” Trudeau informed reporters. He gave no trace as to what it was however stated it “represented an affordable risk to the safety of civilian flight.”

“The safety of residents is our high precedence and that is why I made the choice to have that unidentified object shot down,” he stated.

North America has been on excessive alert for aerial intrusions following the looks of a white, eye-catching Chinese language airship over American skies earlier this month. The 200-foot-tall (60-meter-high) balloon – which People have accused Beijing of utilizing to spy on the USA – brought on a world incident, main Secretary of State Antony Blinken to name off a deliberate journey to China solely hours earlier than he was set to depart.

China denies that the unique balloon was getting used for surveillance, saying it was a civilian analysis craft, and condemned the USA for taking pictures it down off the coast of South Carolina final Saturday.

With navy and intelligence officers newly targeted on airborne threats, at the very least two different flying objects had been shot down over North America over the weekend.

U.S. Senate Majority Chief Chuck Schumer informed U.S. broadcaster ABC that U.S. officers assume the flying objects – the primary of which was introduced down over the ocean ice close to Deadhorse, Alaska, on Friday, and the second of which was destroyed over the Yukon on Saturday – had been each balloons.

“They consider they had been (balloons), sure, however a lot smaller than the primary one,” Schumer stated.

The White Home stated solely that the just lately downed objects “didn’t carefully resemble” the Chinese language balloon, echoing Schumer’s description of them as “a lot smaller.”

Schumer stated he was assured U.S. investigators scouring the ocean off South Carolina to get well particles and digital gadgetry from the unique balloon would resolve what it was getting used for.

“We will most likely be capable to piece collectively this entire, entire surveillance balloon and know precisely what is going on on,” he stated.

Canadian counterparts making an attempt to piece collectively what was shot down over the Yukon could have their very own challenges. The territory is a sparsely populated area in Canada’s far northwest, which borders Alaska. It may be brutally chilly within the winter, however temperatures are unusually delicate for this time of yr which may ease the restoration effort.

In Whitehorse, the capital, the forecast is for a excessive of minus 2 Celsius (28 Fahrenheit) on Sunday.

Talking to Fox Information, Home International Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul stated the Chinese language balloon was “an act of espionage in plain sight plain view of the American individuals,” saying the balloon went over delicate American nuclear websites.

“They need to get imagery, get intelligence on our navy functionality, notably nuclear,” McCaul stated. “They usually’re constructing fairly a nuclear stockpile themselves.”

Surveillance fears could also be making officers jumpy.

Twice in 24 hours, U.S. officers closed airspace – solely to reopen it swiftly. On Sunday, the Federal Aviation Administration briefly closed house above Lake Michigan. On Saturday, the U.S. navy scrambled fighter jets in Montana to analyze a radar anomaly there.

North American Aerospace Protection Command (NORAD) later stated the pilots didn’t establish something comparable to the radar hits.

Republican lawmaker Mike Turner, who serves on the U.S. Home Armed Providers Committee, recommended that President Joe Biden’s administration may be overcompensating for what he described as its beforehand lax monitoring of American airspace.

“They do seem considerably trigger-happy,” Turner informed CNN on Sunday.

“I would like them to be trigger-happy than to be permissive.”