Security concerns for days. Most of the wreckage is believes to be sitting in 47 feet of water at this hour. Lets go now to oren at the pentagon. Do we think we might have get an update this evening as to whether or not they have been able to secure that wreckage and retrieve it . Theyll put a perimeter around it with navy and coast guard assets that were in the area. Whether they can retrieve it tonight or tomorrow, thats a different question. 47 feet of water according to a Senior Defense official, so not that deep, but still its a question of whats left, whats down there and what shape is it in and how do you bring it up without damaging it further. Salvage vessel is on the way. It might not be there in time to do it tonight, but it will get there as quickly as possible to begin. Why is that so important . Because the pentagon has said repeatedly this was a chinese Surveillance Balloon that had the ability to maneuver, loiter. And because of that, theres information they want to gle
you re live in the cnn newsroom. i m jim acosta. we are following breaking news at this hour. the president declaring moments ago that he ordered the pentagon to shoot down the chinese spy balloon as soon as possible. the u.s. is in a recovery effort after a u.s. fighter jet launched a precision strike on the chinese spy balloon. it came after days of watching it float from montana, to missouri to the carolinas. here is another video of that strike. this is a tense moment in u.s./china relations. the world will be watching in the hours and days ahead. let s get straight to cnn s oren liebermann at the pentagon. oren, what more are you learning? i understand you were listening to officials explain how all of this went down. what can you tell us? it started on wednesday when president joe biden gave the authorization to shoot down the chinese balloo n as soon as possible. there were tankers and others to shoot this down. it was an f-22 that fired an a 9 side wind er. the ai
security concerns for days. most of the wreckage is believes to be sitting in 47 feet of water at this hour. let s go now to oren at the pentagon. do we think we might have get an update this evening as to whether or not they have been able to secure that wreckage and retrieve it? they ll put a perimeter around it with navy and coast guard assets that were in the area. whether they can retrieve it tonight or tomorrow, that s a different question. 47 feet of water according to a senior defense official, so not that deep, but still it s a question of what s left, what s down there and what shape is it in and how do you bring it up without damaging it further. salvage vessel is on the way. it might not be there in time to do it tonight, but it will get there as quickly as possible to begin. why is that so important? because the pentagon has said repeatedly this was a chinese surveillance balloon that had the ability to maneuver, loiter. and because of that, there s information
what was going on, what the response was going to be. and, look, china s one of our biggest adversaries, so to see this, you know, when people look up in the sky and i was driving around earlier, people were pulled over on the side of the road, they were pulling out their camera phones. a lot of intrigue about this. you know, this is an interesting, you know, interesting time, but a lot of people have questions about this. and for me, i m incredibly concerned about where, you know, where this was headed and why it took so long to address. mike: a sense of relief as a south carolina congressman that this has been successfully shot down, apparently over the atlantic ocean? i think so, and i m super proud of the men and women at south carolina s shaw air force base for doing so. i think that shows our resolve and that we re able to take any task. it was really interesting to the watch this spy balloon go over my house and to see fighter planes really circling this balloon as i
tonight jacqui line rake traveling with the president in ireland with white house capitol hill reaction as well david spunt be at the justice department. we begin with diswrerch griffin at the pentagon with our story. cyber reporters beat the fbi to the front door of the alleged leaker forcing the surveillance team to accelerator its plans for rearsz outside of the alleged leaker s family home in massachusetts late this afternoon alleged leaker identified as jack of the massachusetts air national guard. according to the air force promoted last july. worked as transport systems journey man. cybersecurity expert. that s how he gained access to some of the nation s biggest secrets. we do have stringent guidelines in place for safeguarding classified and sensitive information. this was a deliberate criminal act. the washington post tracked down a member of the online chat group that teixeira led for the past few years. any claims that he is a russian operative or pro-russ