Posted on 09/18/2023 8:15:21 AM PDT by servo1969
Those F-35 stealth fighters must be even closer to invisible than I thought because the Marines lost one on Sunday and nobody can find it.
A Marine piloting the special vertical takeoff and landing version, the F-35B, suffered some kind of “mishap” and was forced to eject over South Carolina. He ejected safely. He’s fine. We can go on and laugh. The plane, however, was nowhere to be found. Weighing in at over 32,000 pounds even when it isn’t filled with jet fuel, you’d think the missing jet would be easy to find, but no.
There was genuine concern that the autopilot might have been on, meaning that there was an $80 million fighter jet gently cruising around over South Carolina with no pilot and no canopy. Sunday drivers, amirite?
So whoever runs the social media for Joint Base Charleston took to Twitter to ask for help finding the super-invisible stealth fighter.
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An early report from NBC noted that “The jet was left in autopilot mode so there’s a possibility it could still be airborne somewhere over South Carolina.” That was early Sunday evening. Surely, it’s run out of fuel by now. (Yes, and don’t call me Shirley.)
But no one seems to have seen or heard the thing crash.
(Excerpt) Read more at pjmedia.com ...
— Tim Murtaugh (@TimMurtaugh) September 18, 2023
Title should be:
The Marines Need Help Finding a Lost Stealth Fighter and Nobody Can Stop Laughing
Sorry.
Anyone think to check Hunter Bidens drive way?
So how y’all liking Bidenskyyyy’s new woke military so far?
Was the plane headed inland, toward heavily forested areas, or out to sea?
Finders keepers, right?
Maybe a Chinese balloon can find it?
if only someone had invented an Air Tag
Reminds me of this story:
The incident started as a routine training flight. Colonel Nikolai Skuridin, the pilot, was to fly a MiG-23M from the Bagicz Airbase near Kołobrzeg, Poland. During takeoff, the engine's afterburner failed, causing a partial loss of power. At an altitude of 150 m (500 ft) and descending, the pilot elected to abandon the aircraft and ejected safely. However, the engine kept running and the aircraft remained airborne, flying on autopilot in a westerly direction.
The unmanned aircraft left Polish airspace, crossing into East Germany and then West Germany, where it was intercepted by a pair of F-15s from the 32nd Tactical Fighter Squadron of the United States Air Forces Europe, stationed at Soesterberg Air Base in the Netherlands. The F-15 pilots reported that the MiG had no crew. The MiG-23 crossed into Dutch airspace and continued into Belgium. The escorting F-15s were instructed to shoot down the plane over the North Sea, but as the MiG ran out of fuel, it started a slow turn to the south, prompting the French Air Force to put its fighters on alert. After flying over 900 km (560 mi), the MiG eventually crashed into the house at 273 Doorniksesteenweg, in the town of Bellegem, near Kortrijk, some 5-10 km from the French border, killing local teenage resident Wim Delaere.
Nothing can go wr....
Nothing can go wr....
Nothing can go wr....
Oops. Please remit another trillion so....
Nothing can go wr....
China likely has it already. I suspect they got a hold of the ‘high tech’ (meaning GPS) navigation system and spoofed it to one of their many boats hanging out in the Atlantic. Once the pilot realized he had no control of plane (it was basically a remote-controlled drone at that point), he wisely bolted.
Just a hunch, but I base it on the performance of the IDIOTS in charge of the Ukraine War and the fact that something like half of the people working in the design of our high-tech military hardware have Chinese (or at least Asian) roots, as intelligent Americans are too busy going into finance, law, or playing video games.
8
From the article:
“PJ Media’s own Paula Bolyard said that she “spotted it being towed by a chi-com balloon over the Smoky Mountains,” and I almost believe her. If you have a better theory, I’d love to hear it.”
If it was crashing in a sparsely populated or forested area, perhaps that’s why nobody can find it?
But certainly they would have a search area to narrow down where it could be, based on the last known location, etc?
So I’m guessing if they find the plane 200 miles away, that pilot ain’t ever going to be a pilot again after punching out of an airplane worth $80 million tax payer dollars prematurely.
Has anyone asked the pilot?
+1 now that is funny.
In 1956 the Navy lost control of a WWII era Grumman F6F Hellcat that had been converted to a drone. The drone was supposed to be headed out to sea, but circled back and headed inland.
Not to be outdone by the Navy's incompetence, the USAF proved incapable of shooting it down, and eventually it crashed in the desert.
I’ll keep and eye out for it.
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