Marine kin’s anguish
Copter-crash rage
The father of one of the five Marines who died in a helicopter crash during a California storm this week accused the military of letting down US service members and said they must “wake the f- -k up.”
Steven Langen, father of Sgt. Alec Langen, 23, who was serving as crew chief onboard the CH-53E Super Stallion chopper that went down in mountains outside San Diego on Tuesday, told The Post on Saturday that the tragedy is “an alltoo-familiar story in the military community.”
“Maybe this is the one instance to where they wake the f--k up and they say, ‘What are we doing to our service members? We’ve got to stop this,’ ” he said.
The Marines were en route to Air Station Miramar as California was pounded by unprecedented rainfall and snow that had made flight conditions treacherous and unstable.
Officials said Thursday that they are investigating the cause of the crash that also killed Capt. Benjamin Moulton, 27; Capt. Jack Casey, 26; Lance Cpl. Donovan Davis, 21; and Capt. Miguel Nava, 28 — but aviation experts previously told The Post that the weather conditions more than likely contributed to the tragedy.
Bradford Moulton questioned why his nephew and fellow Marines were in the air during “a thousand-year storm.”
“They’re Marines, they fly in nasty weather, they do what they’re supposed to do . . . but I sure wish the operations officer would have kept them on the ground,” he said — a sentiment Davis’ father seconded.
“Not only did it not have to happen, it should not have happened,” said Gregory Davis, a retired naval aviation officer.
In the past three months, 14 service members — including five Army special operations soldiers, eight Air Force special ops members and one Marine — died during training exercises in the Mediterranean, Japan and at California’s Camp Pendleton, respectively.
The Post has reached out to the Marines for comment.
The families of Casey and Nava could not be reached.