You’re making assumptions not based on facts.
Some of this is due to the high operational tempo of the Truman. People get tired, things break, entropy rears its ugly head.
CC
Why is the trashed F-18 unrecoverable? The water isn’t that deep.
Let’s see how long before the commanding officer is relieved of command.
Dodged enemy fire last week and a another plane was lost while in active combat zone conditions.
I’d say let an investigation happen in the normal course. But the silver lining is that no one is dead or seriously injured here.
I suppose this incident could be included in the argument that drones are the future. Like with tanks, expensive warplanes belong in the past.
“Just In: Second F/A-18 Super Hornet Lost in Red Sea from USS Harry S. Truman”
Not a big deal, just restart the production line. Of course we’ll have to buy the titanium from Putin and electronic piece parts from Xi, but no doubt they’ll sell that stuff to us.
LOL!
Time for a stand down.
Whoever is riding the brakes on the jets is not doing his job.
I had a pilot one time wanted to ride brakes on my aircraft during spot.
I rode next to him. This jerk was soon busy chewing his gum that he didn’t hear the whistle to apply brakes. The whistle kept blowing. He didn’t apply the brakes. I had one hand on the canopy eject handle and my right leg hanging out of the right hand seat, ready to jump. Finally this dumbbell pilot put the brakes on.
The aircraft was 3 inches from going overboard.
An idiot riding brakes can easily let an aircraft go overboard. When you are deployed it’s 12 on 12 off 7 days a week...overworked and tired...
Sabotage?
Yes...don’t be too hasty in judgement. Things happen. An anecdote, if I may.
When I was on the USS JFK back in 1977 or 1978 (I cannot recall now) we were deployed to the Mediterranean, and were conducting flight operations under darkened ship and EMCON conditions. That meant all the white lights were off, and there were only red lights on the island and communications were restricted or shut down.
I was all by myself walking on the bow just forward of the angle, picking my way through the planes spotted there, stepping over tie down chains, avoiding the sharp edges of wings and pylons, heading towards one the A-7s our squadron had tied down up there. I cannot remember why I was up there, probably to check something on one of our planes, but there was nobody else around...anywhere.
In the back of my mind, I could hear the routine of flight operations, and there was an approaching aircraft, coming in to land. I wasn’t really paying attention to it, but it did register there was an aircraft approaching the ramp to land, and my unconscious noted it, getting louder, but I was looking in front of me, focused on not walking into the corner of any lowered wing flaps or tripping over a taut chain.
I heard the incoming plane slam onto the deck, and heard its engines go to full power, as is the norm. Again, that sound was registering in my mind, but I was focused on the task at hand.
There were two very loud, staccato booms, almost merged into one, and I instinctively ducked and crouched.
My first thought when I heard it was that it was a compressor stall. I had only heard that once before on the flight deck, when an RF-8 Crusader had experienced one and spit a tongue of flame out of its intake, and this sounded to me just like that. As I straightened and turned towards the source of the sound, I saw the plane fly by, as if it had boltered, missing the arrestor cable.
It was less than 50 feet away, coming off the angle. This is not an uncommon thing, but as I straightened and looked, I saw the silhouette of an aircraft flying by where I stood. Immediately, I knew something was wrong.
It was going too slow. Way too slow. I could not make out the type of plane, but I saw a dark shape, and could see the bright green starboard navigation light on the wingtip nearest to me. I could also see one of the elongated, narrow rectangles of a subdued green color which were called formation lights.
I stared at in in fascination, knowing immediately the plane was going to crash. It was just going too slow. I had seen hundreds of planes coming in to land, missing the cable, and thundering off the flight deck to go around again for a successful landing, but...I had never seen this. I just knew it was going into the drink.
With my eyes riveted on the plane, I began nearly running through all these tied down planes, my eyes no longer looking for sharp things to avoid, but fixed on this black shape. I reached the bow, and somehow, the plane was still flying.
So, here I was, standing on the very bow of the carrier, all by myself, watching this black shape slowly proceed in front of the ship. It was slightly pitched up and even appeared to gain altitude a little bit, as it began to drift slowly in front of the ship. I couldn’t believe I was seeing this.
The plane was now perhaps 100-200 yards in front of the ship, and began, very slowly, to increasingly pitch upwards. Then it paused imperceptibly in mid-air, and began to very slowly descend towards the water, tail first, its engines thundering at full military power. As it descended, it began to pirouette slowly, rotating as it fell.
Watching this, I realized I had been repeating over and over again “Get out! Get out! Eject! Eject!”
The plane hit the water and disappeared instantly, leaving only a frothy white patch of water.
I was dumbstruck.
I thought “My God. They didn’t get out.”
At that point, all the white lights came on, and the 1MC began blaring “PLANE IN THE WATER! PLANE IN THE WATER!”
I saw two parachutes enter the sphere of white light out of the darkened sky, one came down and landed on the flight deck getting hung up on the tail of another plane, while the other chute drifted through the light and disappeared astern into the darkness. He was shortly plucked out of the water by the Sea King that was airborne, and both of the crew only suffered minor injuries.
Of course, the whole ship was awakened, and I ran to my shop down below bursting into our Line Shack shouting from my goggled and helmeted face “YOU WOULD NOT BELIEVE WHAT I JUST F**KING SAW!”
For years, in my memory, I thought it was an F-14 Tomcat that had gone in, but when I was trying to find an account of it, There were no incidents of any F-14s crashing in that time frame off the JFK, but there was an A-6 Intruder. Interesting how that rush of adrenaline completely scrambled my memory of that.
Apparently, when the plane caught the arrestor cable, the the tip of the tailhook just fractured and broke off, and the plane could simply not get up enough airspeed to fly. The point is...these things happen, especially when there is a high tempo of flight operations. It is a dangerous environment, and a lot of things can go wrong as a matter of routine, no matter how careful people are. Things just happen.
When I saw in the article “Arresting gear malfunction” that was the first thing that came to mind.
Not accidental. I believe deliberate negligence.
Somebody can forget about ever reaching flag rank.
On our first med cruise, in 1976/77, the Nimitz lost 7 or 8 aircraft. Some of those were top gun F14 Tomcats. The active duty military is a dangerous job, in peace time.
High level of operations inevitably leads to accidents and losses. Sounds like this was a mechanical malfunction. Fortunately the crew was saved.
JFC I can’t with you people.
Please tell me again how long we've been fighting those turban heads and haven't made a dent. They're still firing them missiles and hitting airports and causing our ships to take erratic maneuvers (which dumps a jet or two into the ocean).
What exactly has all this drama accomplished? I mean the so-called mightiest military in the world, costing us a trillion dollars, fighting them little bitty Houthis. Does this sound like history repeating (Afghanistan, Iraq, Vietnam)?