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Is this the first time that the something was shot down over the continental US (outside of training)?

Apparently not, civil war and WWII (both balloons btw) search for "down" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Army_Balloon_Corps and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fu-Go_balloon_bomb

haha, so the first military aircraft shot down over the US was a case of friendly-fire. The Union shot down it's own reconnaissance balloon, although technically the balloon was a civilian device.

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