One Marine rescued after planes crash
Japanese and U.S. forces search for five Marines still missing
TOKYO — A crash involving a fighter jet and a refueling plane has prompted a scramble to find five missing Marines, with a sixth Marine declared dead and a seventh rescued safely from waters off the coast of Japan, Japanese and American officials said Thursday.
Japan’s Defense Ministry said its maritime forces found two Marines, both of whom were transferred to Japan to receive medical care. It has dispatched planes and ships to continue the search and rescue effort, alongside Japan’s coast guard and the U.S. military.
“We plan to keep at it all through the night,” Adm. Katsutoshi Kawano, chief of the Japan Self-Defense Forces’ Joint Staff, said at a news conference.
The U.S. Marine Corps initially said a “mishap” took place at 2 a.m. local time during routine training about 200 miles off the Japanese coast involving an F/A-18 Hornet fighter jet and a KC-130 Hercules plane.
“The aircraft were conducting routine training, and aerial refueling was a part of the training,” the Marine Corps said in a statement. “As to what was taking place when the mishap occurred, that is under investigation.”
The first Marine was found soon after the incident and taken back to his base at Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni in southern Japan, where he has received medical care and is in “fair” condition, the Marines said.
The second was picked up at 12:13 p.m., more than 10 hours after the crash, and was taken onboard a Japanese naval vessel before being transferred to a Red Cross hospital in Tokushima on the island of Shikoku, said Maj. Gen. Yasuko Onouchi, director general of public affairs in Japan’s Defense Ministry.
A Marine official said one of those Marines was later declared deceased. It was not clear Thursday whether the recovered Marines were in the F/A18 or the KC-130.
The planes took off from Iwakuni, one of the biggest U.S. air bases in East Asia, which sits on the southeastern tip of Japan’s main island of Honshu, about 25 miles from Hiroshima.
The mayor of Iwakuni, Yoshihiko Fukuda, called on the U.S. military to suspend flights until the causes of the accident is determined, especially after another crash involving a Hornet in the Philippine Sea south of Japan last month.