US fighter jet crashes off Japan coast
TOKYO: A US F15 fighter jet crashed off the southern coast of Japan yesterday but the pilot ejected and was rescued by Japanese forces, Tokyo’s defence minister said.
The Japanese military “received information that a crew member of the F15 jet, which belongs to the Kadena Air Base, ejected above the sea some 50 miles south of Naha,” the regional capital of Japan’s southern Okinawa island, Itsunori Onodera told reporters.
About an hour after receiving the initial information, Japanese military officials spotted and rescued the pilot who sustained ‘non-life-threatening’ injuries, Onodera said.
Japan’s public broadcaster NHK said the rescued pilot had a broken leg. Kadena is the largest US military base in Japan, and hosts around 47,000 American troops under a decades-long security alliance.
A series of accidents involving US military aircraft have stoked tensions and in January Defence Secretary James Matt is a po log is ed to his Japanese counterpart over the incidents.
They have included emergency landings by US military helicopters, a piece of a helicopter falling on a Japanese school ground, and a deadly crash last year of an MV-22 Osprey that forced a massive rescue operation.
The US military is investigating the cause of the latest accident “but I’ve requested they share information with us and that they take firm safety measures to prevent a repeat,” Onodera said.
There was no immediate report of other damage caused by the incident, the minister added.