WASHINGTON/OTTAWA - Canada downed an airborne object over its territory on Saturday, the third such incursion into North American airspace in February, while local Chinese media reported an unidentified object flying over one of its cities.

The high-altitude object was identified over Alaska late Friday evening and monitored by US military aircraft as it crossed into Canada, according to the Pentagon. Canadian and US aircraft were scrambled, and a US F-22 fighter jet successfully shot it down over the Yukon.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau coordinated the response with US President Joe Biden. The object was brought down by an AIM 9X missile.

Canadian investigators are hunting for the wreckage of the mysterious flying object, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Sunday, as the US Senate’s top lawmaker said that it - and another flying object shot down off the coast of Alaska - both appeared to be balloons.

“Recovery teams are on the ground, looking to find and analyse the object,” Trudeau told reporters. He gave no hint as to what it was but said it “represented a reasonable threat to the security of civilian flight.”

“The security of citizens is our top priority and that’s why I made the decision to have that unidentified object shot down,” he said.

Meanwhile, China was getting ready to take down an unidentified object spotted flying over waters near the port city of Qingdao, Chinese news outlet The Paper reported on Sunday, citing an employee at Qingdao’s Jimo district marine development authority.

An employee at the authority said “relevant authorities” were preparing to bring down the object, the report said. The employee was not informed what the object was. The person said fishermen in the area have been told to be careful about safety, the report added.

The drama began earlier in February when a balloon traversed North America, gripping global attention and sparking a diplomatic standoff between the United States and China.

The US has said the balloon was sent deliberately by China for surveillance, while Beijing countered it was a harmless weather-monitoring device that blew off course. The US military shot it down on Feb 4 off the coast of South Carolina.

It was unclear what the last two objects were or where they originated. No evidence has yet been made public to indicate that the three episodes are connected. Calls to China’s foreign ministry on Sunday for comments on the latest incidents were unanswered.

Mr Biden ordered the takedown of a smaller unidentified object spotted about 40,000 feet (12km) over Alaska on Friday. That same day, the third object was sighted at a similar altitude by the North American Aerospace Defence Command (Norad), a joint US-Canada military command responsible for aerospace and maritime warning.

“It appears to be a small, cylindrical object” – smaller than the first balloon – and posed a reasonable threat to the safety of civilian flights, Ms Anita Anand, Canada’s defence minister, said of the latest object.

Ms Anand declined to speculate on the origins of the latest object, saying it was too early, but added that broadly, “we need to be wide eyes open on China”.

In order to determine more details on the purpose and origin of the devices, Canadian Forces will recover and analyse the wreckage of the latest object, while US crews have been working to recover the remnants of the balloon and the second object.

In a sign of the heightened jitters over the incursions, the US on Saturday ordered a temporary closure of airspace over Montana after it detected a “radar anomaly”. Fighter aircraft sent to investigate did not detect any object that correlated with the radar hits, Norad said, adding that it will continue to monitor the situation. The restriction has since been lifted.

The incidents have shone a spotlight on China’s supposed surveillance programmes. The US alleges that the balloon was part of a years-long, military-led spy programme spanning more than 40 countries, a claim rejected by Beijing.

In a series of briefings and hearings with lawmakers last Thursday, US officials said the balloon was carrying equipment with sensors designed to pick up communications signals, and pointed to the fact that it had hovered over sensitive US military sites during its transit across the US.

China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning said last Friday that the balloon was a civilian craft and that its transit across the US last week was an “isolated, unexpected incident”.

A US intelligence report released in January said reporting of unidentified aerial phenomena has increased, as the stigma surrounding claims of UFO sightings lessens and awareness increases about the threats such objects may pose. BLOOMBERG, REUTERS