Military tracking high-altitude balloon flying over Western U.S.

How high do hot air balloons go? And I'm wondering what dropoff a air rifle has.

Hot air balloon + the Milwaukee leaf blower is USAF new budget request

This is a weird URL because it is "news" but applies equally well to very old events, so it seems ambiguous as a resource locator.

Man, these balloons remind me of the modified SM-3 that shot down a satellite... you know... because safety.

In… what way? Are you suggesting the balloon is the SM-3? Or that we should fire SM-3’s at these balloons?

Or just that these are two military events, so they’re similar?

OK, which HN'er did this?