"One of the arresting gear cables - the tensioned wires that US Navy fighter jets hook onto during landings at sea - had broken as the crucial machinery that absorbs the landing plane's force came apart beneath the flight deck. The failure destabilized the F/A-18 Super Hornet that had just touched down. Asymmetric forces threw the aircraft off-center. With no chance of regaining flight, the aviators ejected as it shot off the deck and into the sea."
"The May 6 incident, which injured two naval aviators, marked the second Super Hornet loss in a matter of days - and the third overall for the carrier USS Harry S. Truman's Middle East deployment. The command investigation into the costly mishap details how one of the carrier's arresting cables failed to stop the fighter jet, which left a trail of sparks and flames as it flipped off the flight deck and into the Red Sea."
A carrier landing on May 6 suffered a catastrophic arresting gear cable failure that sent debris across a machinery room and nearly hit a sailor. The broken cable destabilized an F/A-18 Super Hornet as it landed, producing asymmetric forces that threw the aircraft off-center and forced the aviators to eject before the jet plunged into the Red Sea. Two naval aviators were injured and equipment was damaged. The loss was part of multiple Super Hornet incidents during the USS Harry S. Truman deployment and was described by Navy leadership as preventable.
Read at Business Insider
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]