Marine Fires 4 over San Diego Crash // The Fighting 44s

Mar 04, 2009

Marine Fires 4 over San Diego Crash

3 Responses | Leave a Comment »

(Double posted on big WOWO)

Remember this?

The investigation criticized the pilot, who was being trained on the F/A-18, for not consulting a pocket checklist that outlined emergency procedures. While controllers aboard the aircraft carrier that launched the jet urged the pilot to land at a nearby Navy airfield at North Island, squadron officers relied on “incorrect assumptions and inaccurate data” to guide him back to the plane’s base at the Miramar Marine Corps Air Station.

“No one in the ready room stated or understood the severity of the low fuel emergency at this time,” Rupp said. “This is a critical moment, and this is collectively bad decision-making by the duty officer, by the operations officer and by the squadron’s commanding officer.”

It looks like the military had an investigation, and people are being punished. Good to hear.

Seriously, there is no excuse when a military plane, flying over the citizens whom the military is supposed to protect, crashes and kills civilians. “Mistakes” like this are not acceptable. I’m glad that the Marines are taking steps to find those who are responsible.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 4th, 2009 at 2:54 am and is filed under Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

3 Responses

nskripchun

2:59 am | Mar 04, 2009

ABC News details many of the mistakes here:

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Story?id=7002309&page=1

Completely preventable tragedy. Their words. The sad thing is that other people are the ones that paid the highest costs for the mistakes made by those Marines… but at least an investigation took place and people were held accountable.

jaehwan

3:34 am | Mar 04, 2009

Wow. 13 of them have been disciplined. Good. Someone needs to send a message that this kind of thing can’t be tolerated.

You know, the thing about this is that I can understand a plane crashing when under enemy fire over enemy terrain. But flying over San Diego? That kind of error (or series of errors) deserves a thorough investigation.

THX1138

4:08 pm | Mar 06, 2009

More analysis of this crash and the probable criminal negligence that led to the tragedy. It does not paint a pretty picture of the behavior of the pilot:

The Military’s “Breathtaking” Contempt for US Civilian Lives
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/025684.html

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