A $60 million F/A-18 Super Hornet took a nose-dive off the USS Harry S. Truman and straight into the Red Sea. This wasn’t some Top Gun stunt gone rogue or some other fantastical moment of high drama. Someone was just trying to park the thing.
During what should’ve been a routine tow job in the hangar bay, things went awry, and the jet, along with the tractor that towed it, slipped into the ocean so that tens of millions that could have gone to something beneficial to the American populace could freak out a passing parrotfish.
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Thankfully, the pilot and the sailor driving the tug bailed out just in time. One sailor walked away with minor injuries. According to a defense official, the jet was part of Strike Fighter Squadron 136.
The whole incident is under investigation, as the Navy scrambles to figure out how a plane that’s supposed to fly in the sky is now swimming in the ocean.
U.S. Fighter Jet Sinks Into the Sea After Falling Off Hangar Deck
The Truman has been in the Middle East for months, being used by the military to conduct strikes on Houthi rebels and generally providing an ominous US naval presence in the region using a variety of vehicles, including fighter jets, drones, bombers, and ships.
Pete Hegseth, whose stint as the Secretary of Defense went so bad so quickly that Trump officials are already talking about getting rid of him, has already extended the ship’s deployment.
As for recovering the now-submerged aircraft? Unclear. It’s sitting somewhere in the Red Sea like it’s eager to join the SS United States in becoming an artificial reef, and nobody’s rushing to fish it out just yet. Maybe it’ll become a tourist attraction. Or maybe it’s just another weird entry in the long, long, long history of unforced and wildly expensive military mishaps.
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