State police using shotguns to deflate wayward blimp 

MUNCY, Pa. (AP) — State police used shotguns Thursday to deflate a wayward surveillance blimp that broke loose in Maryland before coming down into trees in the Pennsylvania countryside.

The military was in the process of gathering up some 6,000 feet of tether, and the blimp’s tail section could be removed Thursday afternoon, said U.S. Army Captain Matthew Villa. The much-larger hull, however, was still in the process of deflating and will be removed in “the next day or so,” he said Thursday afternoon.

When the blimp went down in trees along a ravine, it still had helium in its nose that had to be drained. The “easiest way possible” to do so was to shoot it, Villa said, so state police troopers peppered the white behemoth with about 100 shots.

The slow-moving, unmanned Army surveillance blimp broke loose from its mooring at Aberdeen Proving Ground and then floated over Pennsylvania for hours Wednesday afternoon causing electrical outages as its tether hit power lines.

The 240-foot helium-filled blimp, which had two fighter jets on its tail, came down near Muncy, a small town about 80 miles north of Harrisburg, the state capital. No injuries were reported.

Very sensitive electronics onboard have been removed, Villa said.

Villa said it was unknown how the blimp broke loose, and an investigation was underway.