If a ship gets in trouble for some reason, any reason, no reason, the Captain is held accountable and is almost always disciplined/demoted by a Court Martial.
I don’t see how these jets with all their electronic warning systems can collide unless the pilots made serious miscalculations.
Does anyone know if pilots face the same sort of draconian accountability as ship Captains?
Sure, up to and including death. Likely doing ACM and either collided or lost SA and crashed.
Formation flying is somewhat dangerous at times. Yes to a degree that they were responsible they get a reprimand.Draconian? What would you do to an employee who destroyed a 35 million dollar factory through his negligence? Promote him? Give him a week off? Don't think so.
Officers cannot be demoted by a court-martial panel. Other that that, you’re right.
I’m not sure that would apply to the captain of a carrier where you have an air wing. That wing isn’t permanently on the carrier. Can the crashes be traced to a pilot training error when the squadron was ashore?
Depends on the circumstances. A full investigation is always run because sometimes it's the pilot's fault and sometimes there is a system glitch. We had a helo run out of fuel and crash. It turns out that there was an unknown problem with that model of CH-46 at the time - If you kept turning one direction in executing a search pattern, the gyro would precess. So, in this case, the pilot did exactly what he should have done, but at the end of the pattern found that he was no where near the ship.
I don't know what you mean by "draconian accountability," but the pilots will be held accountable thru an investigation process, which will determine the cause of the accident. If one or both are deemed personally responsible, then their careers are in jeopardy. I would not assume it is just pilot error.