US flights continuing despite Chinese balloon alert

Commercial flights are to continue in the US even as the country’s military tracks what it said is a Chinese spy balloon hovering above Montana, a state where the US stores nuclear weapons. “The balloon is currently travelling at an altitude well above commercial air traffic, and does not present a military or physical threat to people on the ground,”  Pentagon spokesman Pat Ryder told media during a late evening briefing on February 2. “We are confident that this high-altitude surveillance balloon belongs to the PRC [People’s Republic of China]”, Ryder said, adding the balloon entered US airspace “a couple