Petty Officer 1st Class Tyler Thompson/US Navy via Getty Images
- Commercial fishermen found an unusual object off Alaska's coast and are bringing it to the FBI, per CNN.
- Photos of the object show similarities with past surveillance balloons, the outlet reported.
- The object is expected to be further examined once the ship reaches port this weekend.
A group of commercial fishermen are en route to deliver an object discovered off the coast of Alaska to the FBI, CNN reported.
The outlet, citing three sources, said the object — which intelligence experts suspect could be another spy balloon — is expected to be analyzed at an FBI lab in Quantico after the ship reaches port sometime this weekend.
Although it is yet to be determined exactly what the fishermen found, the FBI believed after viewing photographs of the object that it was similar enough to past surveillance balloons to warrant further observation, CNN reported.
An FBI spokesperson told Business Insider the agency is aware of debris found off the coast of Alaska by a commercial fishing vessel and will assist with the logistics of the debris recovery.
A Department of Defense official referred BI to the FBI.
On February 24, a hobbyist's balloon had defense officials on alert after it was spotted over the Western US, CBS reported. Before the balloon was identified, CBS noted, some military officials suspected it could be a surveillance device.
Early last year, after a week adrift over the continental United States, the military shot down a high-altitude balloon off the coast of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
It was later determined that the device was a Chinese spy balloon that may have been equipped with a feature called "synthetic aperture radar," which would have enabled it to observe objects in the dark or through clouds.
Additional balloons were spotted flying over Latin America last February, as well as drifting over Hawaii in May.
During last year's incidents, intelligence officials stressed that the balloons did not pose "a military or physical threat to people on the ground," BI previously reported.
