Seven sailors were injured on Monday after a pilot of the US F-35 fighter jet crashed on the deck of the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier. The US Navy said in a statement that the incident happened in the South China Sea during a routine flight operation.
“The pilot safely ejected from the aircraft and was recovered via U.S. military helicopter,” it said. “The pilot is in stable condition. There were seven total Sailors injured.”
The statement said three of personnel required evacuation to a medical facility in Manila and four were treated by on-board the carrier and released. It said all the personnel evacuated were assessed as being in stable condition.
The Navy said the cause of the “inflight mishap” was under investigation.
The statement did not provide information about the condition of the F-35C aircraft and whether the USS Carl Vinson sustained any physical damage.
The Philippine government has yet to issue a statement about the incident.
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The F-35C was the last of the three variants to become operational, doing so in only 2019. Carl Vinson was the first of the US Navy’s 11 aircraft carriers to deploy with the F-35C when it left San Diego last August.
While the Monday crash in South China was reportedly the second crash of an F-35 stealth fighter, the F-35C or the US Navy’s variant of the single-engine jet was the first-ever. On January 4, a South Korean pilot of F-35C had to make an emergency “belly landing” at an airbase after its landing gear malfunctioned, CNN reported, citing South Korean Airforce. In the past years F-35s have met with at least eight such accidents, a website F-16.net recorded.
(With inputs from agencies)
