First, I’m a balloon pilot, hot air, not gas (as in helium or hydrogen).
Second- expensive ordnance was a waste of our tax dollars to bring down the high altitude balloon with instrument arrays underneath. In talking to many other LTA pilots we agreed It would have been a lot more efficient to throw a hammer (or some other inert object) at the envelope and rip a hole in it allowing the gas to escape gradually and have it descend slowly thereby saving the time and $$ to look for the debris in the ocean. (More tax $$ wasted). One other issue recreational gas balloon pilots have raised is that looking forward, if any yahoo with a high powered rifle sees a lower altitude manned gas balloon flying below 10000ft they might be prone to think its another spy balloon and take a shot at it to bring it down. There are people like that that walk among us.