south carolina? that F-35 got hooked to somebody's F-450 dually within minutes of landing and towed into the hay barn. there are currently eight to fourteen guys at varying stages of three sheets to the wind staring at it while rewinding/forwarding Top Gun. https://t.co/hBxkDo0mnN

— Yell in a Strike (@jelenawoehr) September 18, 2023

How da blinking flip do you lose a plane? I know the US is a big old place

That really. The list of missing planes is fascinating. Very long, but still fascinating

That really. The list of missing planes is fascinating. Very long, but still fascinating

Apart from the odd one in an absolute wilderness, nearly all of these have gone missing over water.

Finding a crashed aeroplane underwater can be quite difficult and time consuming. I used to do it for a living.

I found one up a mountain in Africa 74 years after it had gone missing. It was found 14 years earlier but then couldn’t be ‘re-found’.

The world is a big place to lose relatively small things.

Wasn’t there a case in America only a wee while ago, when Steve Fossett went missing flying his own plane from one well used local airport to a fairly other well used private airport, they never found his crash site during the search, and it was only a year later that a walker stumbled across it. They did though, while they were looking for him, find a couple of decades old crash sites of other planes that had gone missing..?

Yeah, eight I believe. Bonkers, but great closure for the families.

Finding a crashed aeroplane underwater can be quite difficult and time consuming. I used to do it for a living

I’ve seen thunderball, it didn’t look that difficult

How da blinking flip do you lose a plane? I know the US is a big old place, but that is impressive.

If they ejected at altitude then it could have gone a reasonable distance before crashing.
There was an nutty example of a soviet pilot ejecting and the fighter flying another six hundred miles before eventually crashing after running out of fuel.
Although for the fans of the f-450 scenario there was also a case of a US pilot ejecting which somehow corrected the problems with the plane which then landed almost perfectly by itself in a field.

 somehow corrected the problems with the plane which then landed almost perfectly by itself in a field.

The Cornfield Bomber 

We’re working with @MCASBeaufortSC to locate an F-35 that was involved in a mishap this afternoon. The pilot ejected safely. If you have any information that may help our recovery teams locate the F-35, please call the Base Defense Operations Center at 843-963-3600.

— Joint Base Charleston (@TeamCharleston) September 17, 2023

“a mishap” 😁

Some of the comments on that post are gold.

F106 story is bonkers and brilliant at the same time.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/f-35-cant-be-found-after-pilot-ejected

A lot more information above, the pilot had an unspecified emergency, set the jet onto autopilot and punched out, his companion pilot kept station and followed him down to make sure his ‘chute had opened correctly and he landed safely. Meanwhile, the F-35 carried on flying, its transponder was switched off, so ADS-B has no track, and of course, it’s a stealthy aircraft! Scroll down to the comments, definitely worth a read.

I believe it was fly NW, away from the coast, but America is sodding huge, and if it came down in a forested area, then it’s probably almost invisible from above.

If they ejected at altitude then it could have gone a reasonable distance before crashing.
There was an nutty example of a soviet pilot ejecting and the fighter flying another six hundred miles before eventually crashing after running out of fuel.

There was an incident just after WW2 when an American bomber flying over southern England got lost, so the crew set its autopilot and baled out, leaving the plane flying all on its own. That is, until a piece of high ground a couple of miles outside of Chippenham got in its way…

It was apparently a Convair B-36 ‘Peacemaker’, the world’s biggest bomber at the time, and nuclear capable.

https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/152762

According to a published newspaper report (“Wiltshire Gazette & Herald” 6 February 2003):

“6th February 2003
Bomber flew 30 miles without a crew

FIFTY years ago on February 7 one of the world’s largest aircraft crashed near Lacock, and the crash remains unexplained to this day.

Chippenham historian Paul Moran who has compiled newspaper reports of the accident and talked to witnesses, says the B-36 bomber, carrying top secret military equipment, flew 30 miles over the north Wiltshire countryside without pilot or crew, before plummeting to the ground.

The plane could have crashed in Chippenham with a heavy death toll but fortunately it came down in an isolated location at Nethermore Woods, near Pitters Farm, at Sandy Lane

Just to indicate how close to a disaster that B-36 crash came, here’s a section of map showing Chippenham and the crash location, circled in the bottom right.
The town was significantly smaller back then, but we’re not talking a bigger margin of error.

And to give better context, here’s a map showing Fairford at the top right, and the crash site at the bottom left, and how little deviation would have been needed for it to hit the town.

Ms. RM’s mum was one of the handful of survivors of the Frecklington air disaster. Planes falling out of the sky is bad news all round.

Someone suggested this as a way to find the jet…

The only thing to do is to wait until it starts its own Twitter/Instagram account, and then start tracking it based on the selfies.

@relapsed_mandalorian

wow I’d never heard of that disaster. That was a real tragedy and it seems the US didn’t really atone properly

It’s been found… https://media.notthebee.com/articles/article-65086b1434420.jpg

wow I’d never heard of that disaster. That was a real tragedy and it seems the US didn’t really atone properly

I assume it’s Freckleton rather than Frecklington?
It’s well known locally but as you say, very little info elsewhere.

I assume it’s Freckleton rather than Frecklington?
It’s well known locally but as you say, very little info elsewhere.

That’s the one, I’m not local. Haha.

But yeah, not widely known, a proper tragedy.

BREAKING: F-35 stealth fighter jet found in Mar-a-Lago bathroom pic.twitter.com/RhBlTsHBcT

— Keith Nagy (@nagy_minaj) September 18, 2023

The memes are good, but it really has been found now, still in S. Carolina… https://www.reuters.com/world/us/anyone-seen-my-f-35-us-searches-fighter-jet-after-mishap-2023-09-18/

A bit more follow-up…

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/he-just-lost-it-in-the-weather-audio-from-f-35-crash-response-emerges

There are some references in the comments further down in that article, and contrary to what many seem to think, the F-35 has a remarkable record in comparison to most combat jets, here’s a screenshot of the relevant information, look at the F-16, for example…

Two Norwegian F35a landed on a motorway in Finland, hot-refuelled, engines running, and took off again.

Apparently a first for the a-variant without VTOL https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/lockheed-martin-f-35a-fighter-jets-land-motorway-2023-09-22/

Two Norwegian F35a landed on a motorway in Finland, hot-refuelled,

I never saw the point in taxiing to a petrol station to be honest.