NEBRASKA CITY - Amy Mincer saw a report of a Chinese spy balloon on the news Thursday night and was surprised this morning when she saw a slow-moving glow south of Nebraska City as she crossed the Missouri River bridge.

Mincer: “It was a bright light hanging in the sky. It was not a celestial object.”

She stopped to take photographs and then continued toward Peru, where she works. She said she could see the balloon as she traveled as it floated at high altitude southward along the river basin.

The Pentagon says the spy balloon was expected to cross the South Dakota border into Nebraska at 7 a.m. Friday.

Overnight, it is expected cross northeastern Kansas and into central and southern Missouri by Saturday morning.

Locally it appears to have traveled from Nebraska City to Rulo between 7:30 and 9:30 a.m.

The direction is based on assumptions from meteorologists who say the balloon likely traveled on wind currents from mainland China.

Other predictions say it will travel over Kentucky and Tennessee.

 

 

News about a balloon broke nationally when it was spotted near the Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana. U.S. officials reported high confidence that it was a high-altitude object about the size of three buses with a technology bay suspended beneath.

U.S. defense officials say the balloon has limited value in terms of providing intelligence that couldn’t be obtained by other technologies, such as spy satellites.

Reports say President Joe Biden did not give an order to shoot it down because falling debris could cause injuries.

China’s Foreign Ministry says the balloon is a civilian airship used mainly for meteorological purposes. The statement said the airship has limited steering capability and deviated far from its planned course because of winds.

 

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Photo caption: The photo slides on the left and bottom were taken at 7:30 a.m. near the Missouri River bridge at Nebraska City looking southward. The top right is a photo of the Chinese spy balloon released by national media.