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Many times when a UFO is sighted, even if it's reported to the authorities, nothing really happens - either the witness is not believed or whatever they are seeing is just written off as a sky lantern or a drone or a plane. However, when a mysterious object was spotted over Kauai, Hawaii last week, the U.S. military took action, scrambling fighter planes to check it out.
Major General Kenneth Hara, Hawaii's adjutant general, then tweeted about it to update residents who were anxious either because they saw the UFO or F-22s in the sky. He wrote, "In regards to aerial activity over Kauai on 2-14: U.S. Indo-Pacific Command detected a high-altitude object floating in air in the vicinity of the Hawaiian Islands. In accordance with homeland defense procedures, Pacific Air Forces launched tactical aircraft to intercept and identify the object, visually confirming an unmanned balloon without observable identification markings."
The type of aircraft was not specified, but the only fighter jets stationed in Hawaii are F-22s. A photo one resident shared shows the UFO with two fighter jets approaching it. While the jets are hard to make out, the contrails behind them are evident.
According to an Air Force spokesperson, the jets "did not destroy the balloon" and the Air Force is now "actively monitoring it via joint capabilities, and it is under evaluation."
The issue is not the potential of extra-terrestrial life, rather that balloons can be used for surveillance, with data from radar and communications networks being collected by them. With the Pacific Missile Range's primary facility, which is capable of supporting surface, subsurface, air and space operations, located on the northern shore of Kauai, depending on who sent up that balloon, this could be a fairly significant issue, one that the military needs to keep an eye on.