US F-18 Jet Falls Off Destroyer in Mediterranean Sea

By Staff, Agencies

Extreme weather conditions in the Mediterranean Sea have blown a US fighter jet into the sea.

The “unexpected heavy weather” blew the F/A-18 Super Hornet aboard the USS Harry S. Truman overboard, the Navy said in a statement in Naples, Italy.

The Navy said one sailor was injured while conducting operations during the unexpected heavy weather.

Navy inspectors were investigating the cause, as well as the details, regarding the unusual incident.

Oftentimes jet fighters crash into the deck of destroyers. However, rarely do the jets fall off the vessels into the sea.

Aircraft aboard military ships are usually tied with chains to the deck during heavy weather.

One of the last known incidents in which a plane was blown off the flight deck happened in 1995.

In that incident, which happened on the USS Independence, the jet engine exhaust of a F-14 Tomcat fighter jet blew another Tomcat into the water.

The Navy said it was yet to be decided whether to salvage the Super Hornet from the sea bottom. The Mediterranean Sea has an average depth of 1.5 km.

In March, the Navy recovered an F-35C Lightning II fighter jet from a depth of 3.7 km in the South China Sea after the plane crashed into the deck of the USS Carl Vinson and slid into the water.