High-altitude balloons are not new — NASA conducts scientific observations via balloon and the National Weather Service sends out 75,000 balloons every year to help monitor conditions.
The US military is also looking to use these cheap, simple balloons for quick intelligence gathering and surveillance, among other capabilities, said Wes Rumbaugh, Associate Fellow, Missile Defense Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"I think that they're sort of a supplemental capability," Rumbaugh told Insider. "It kind of fits a nice middle point between the very expensive and exquisite satellites that the US deploys in space and the various aircraft systems that the United States deploys for a lot of these missions."
Because there are so many balloons in the sky, Rumbaugh said there would probably be regulations set in place between the FAA and the Department of Defense regarding this airspace, but he did not see the DOD and the space tourism industry having to compete for air space in any way.
In fact, Rumbaugh said, there might be potential for collaboration between the two industries to better understand the travel paths of these balloons.
"If there are any developments in steering or predictability of wind currents, that would be a potential area where DOD and the civilian organizations could collaborate."