There have been unconfirmed reports of an explosion in the skies over Billings, Mont., where a Chinese spy balloon had been hovering for several days. Although there have not been any official reports, there is speculation (not unfounded) that the U.S. military shot down the rogue balloon, the payload of which is the size of two to three school buses; the size of the balloon dwarfs that payload.

Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte, who was appearing on Fox News when the story broke, told Tucker Carlson: “I was notified of it just minutes before we came on the air, and we’re monitoring the situation. I’m talking to our National Guard to find out if they have additional information.” He said he expects to be briefed on the situation in the next hour.

Here’s what the reported explosion looked like from a Billings, Mont., Twitter user’s vantage point:

She reported that she “saw a jet go by so fast and then [an] explosion in the sky.”

Another individual on Twitter claims that he also spotted the explosion and was prevented from searching for it by the National Guard:

There are also reports—again, unconfirmed—that there was a massive show of air power over Montana:

There were also unconfirmed reports of American fighter jets in the area, although some Twitter users are claiming the video is a hoax or an old video, or saying that what’s being called an explosion is merely a jet contrail. Others are speculating that it looks like the work of a surface-to-air missile. To my (admittedly untrained) eye, it looks similar to the explosion of the Challenger space shuttle in 1986. At this point, it’s impossible to draw any definite conclusions. We just don’t know enough at this point.

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One problem with the story is that the balloon has reportedly been spotted in other states, including Missouri. Earlier today, a U.S. official said that the balloon was headed toward the Midwest and is now over “the middle of the country,” leading to speculation that there may be a second balloon. There are reportedly additional balloons hovering in Canada and Costa Rica.

China has admitted to owning the balloon but claims that it accidentally wandered into U.S. airspace.

Gianforte said that earlier in the week, he was not briefed by federal authorities until the balloon was “hundreds of miles into Montana. It had already flown near the [Malmstrom] Air Force Base and the ICBM silos.”

“When I finally got informed, it was over our most populous city [Billings],” he added. “It got spotted by a photographer at the airport.”

“If it was up to Montanans,” Gianforte said, “this thing would have been taken out of the sky the moment it entered our sovereign airspace. It clearly had been there a while. It’s not moving that fast.”

He said that in early briefings with the federal government, “they were contemplating taking it out of the sky. For whatever reason, they didn’t do that. Now, clearly, this went to the president’s desk. He was given options. For whatever reason, he chose not to act, and unfortunately, the result of that is that Americans are endangered and our enemies are emboldened.”

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