Naval Aviation- Bad Day in the South China Sea
USS Nimitz (CVN-68)
Navy helicopter, jet crash in South China Sea in separate incidents
By Beth Sullivan
A U.S. Navy helicopter and a fighter jet assigned to the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz crashed in the South China Sea on Sunday in separate incidents less than an hour apart, the Navy said.
“All personnel involved are safe and in stable condition,” U.S. Pacific Fleet said in a brief statement.
At approximately 2:45 p.m. local time, an MH-60R Sea Hawk helicopter attached to the Nimitz “went down in the waters of the South China Sea while conducting routine operations,” U.S. Pacific Fleet said. Assets assigned to the carrier’s strike group rescued the helicopter’s three crew members. The helicopter was assigned to the “Battle Cats” of Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron 73.
About 30 minutes later, at 3:15 p.m., an F/A-18F Super Hornet fighter jet from the Strike Fighter Squadron 22 “Fighting Redcocks” also crashed in the South China Sea while conducting routine operations, according to the statement. Both crew members successfully ejected from the jet and were rescued, U.S. Pacific Fleet said.
Very glad all are now safe. Thanks to Jeff for the link.
Category: Big Navy, Guest Link
Expensive day, but thankfully no one died. Some days are like that.
Totally off subject, but something to give a thought to.
If you want to fit in with the crowd here at TAH, make a slight change to your sign-in name.
Change it to “Not a Lawer” instead of “Not a Lawyer”
The use of “Lawer” is attributed to Ron Mailahn, one of the posers busted by Jonn in 2014 when he claimed to be the youngest Marine SGM in history.
Mailahn exact quote was “I will keep sending u my request till u do oh I contacted my lawer if its not down with in 2s hrs I will sue u”
So, after Jonn said he hoped he would never start typing like a 12-year-old, the moniker of “lawer” has found a permanent place of honor here on TAH.
Thank You.
I always use “lawer” here, even though I was one for over 35 years.
There are quite a few idioms repeated here that outsiders and newbies may not fully appreciate.
Viet of The Nam
Proud but humble woman owned business
Psual of The Ballsack
Going Full Bernath
Feel free to add more.
Speaking of Bernath….
-6 ft AGL
Constant altitude and temperature.
Bet he’s gotta lot of bugs on his windscreen now….
PTS of the D.
The book of face.
FIRST!
I’m still a relative newcomer but the stories and drama behind those idioms all make me smile. No, they make me fukin laugh out loud – who am I fooling?
I see. He should have contacted his lawyer instead, the offending post wouldn’t have been taken down; but maybe he would have learned why.
Serving in the military carries risk. I imagine carrier ops are somewhat more risky.
Glad the crews are OK.
Blaming bad fuel? You’d figure someone, or somebodies, would be responsible for testing for contaminated or substandard fuel.
But I wouldn’t know, I r grunt. What say you Swabbies?
JP5 is supposed to be tested daily during flying ops if I remember correctly
Don’t know what caused the helo to go into the drink but I remember one of BLT Marine Hueys trying to land on our flight deck and it possibly lost power a number of feet before the side of the ship with a loss of 3 Marines, one jumped out without dumping his mortar plate and 2 inside were still strapped in when the UDT members brought them out. We watched a helo trying to land on the aft section of one of the LPD’s while underway and we just watched at a distance as the helo went into the wake of the ship. I don’t remember what happened to the vrew and onboard Marines. This happened off of Seville Spain during Op. Steel Pike 1
back in 1964.
A little early to assign blame. After all, helos are a crash looking for a place to happen and to get an -18 in the air you have to light it on fire.
Glad I’m not in that chain of command having some ‘splainin’ to do.
Also glad all personnel are ok
No enemy EMP?
The webs was full of conspiracy theories today.
Aliens shooting particle weapons from that Atlas space junk?
Deck ops forgot to put in enough quarters? (Below)
Both aircraft had information that’d lead to the arrest and conviction of Hillary Clinton?
The aliens would need serious range – that “artifact” is currently on the far side of the Sun from us.
That particular crashed F/A18 should be renamed “Flaccid Redcock”.
(ducks, runs, hides)
Yeahhhh I was wondering about that “Redcock” moniker. I’m a wee bit surprised that the post-tailhook Navy allows it.
A Wing-11 sister squadron onboard NAS Jax had the best logo.
Had.
Is that Chick single, just asking
Here’s a squadron name that got me: VA-46 Clansmen.
Now, I know the tartan “V” represent the Scottish Clans, but how did this name slip past leadership? Maybe the Highlanders would have been a better name.
It’s only raciss if it’s “Klansmen”. As is, it’s only sexist. “Clansperson” won’t fit on the fin.
Bummer that we lost a couple of perfectly good aircraft, but at least nobody got hurt or killed.
News last night indicated there is a possibility of fuel contamination.
Was it not clean, dry and servicable?