Apparently from the 48th FW at Lakenheath.

 

Edited June 15, 20205 yr by Chock

Oh dear! Prayers for the pilot's survival. From the report I gather the pilot didn't punch out?

Last I read they haven't found him. Doesn't look good.

 

Bill W

57 minutes ago, n4gix said:

I gather the pilot didn't punch out?

I presume not.

As far as I'm aware, ejections trigger a location beacon, both on the seat and on the pilot's portable radio although it's conceivable that a radio or radios might not be functioning. I presume if the pilot did eject then there is a life raft as part of the survival equipment too and some flares. One assumes too that it is likely other F-15s (or at the very least one other) were in the area too at the time of the incident, so I'd guess they'd have a reasonably good idea of where the thing went down. However, from high altitude, if you eject, you can easily take fifteen minutes to come down if there is thermal activity and any appreciable wind could carry you quite a long way from a crash site.

I can't imagine anyone wanting to try to ditch an F-15 if they had the choice to bang out near a ship, so it could be the case that it all went wrong quite quickly.

Even though it is quite humid today over the UK with some thunderstorm activity owing to that rising hot air, the North Sea can be very cold, as anyone who's ever swam in it will confirm; I would think you'd be starting to get in real trouble after maybe three hours in that water if you did not have a life raft, so let's hope the pilot is in a raft.

On the plus side, I should think it would be comparatively easy to locate the aeroplane wreckage if no other aircrew on the scene managed to pinpoint the crash at the time. The North Sea is not very deep, averaging a depth of about 300 feet owing to the European continental shelf; in many places it is so shallow that this prevents ships from submerging below the surface if they sink. Thus a patrol aeroplane of the kind used to find subs, equipped with a magnetometer and flying in wide patterns, has a fairly decent chance to find the wreckage of the aeroplane pretty quickly. From there it would be possible to track surface currents and that would help rescuers to choose a likely location to commence their search box from in order to locate the pilot if he is in a raft or floating in a vest. There are some pretty deep bits of the North Sea too though, so this is not guaranteed.

Edited June 15, 20205 yr by Chock

Pilot has been found dead unfortunately. No cause given for the crash.

Edited June 15, 20205 yr by Chock

How tragic. I hope they will eventually retrieve the wreckage and determine just what went pear-shaped.

Condolences for the pilot's family and friends.

Given the fact that the F-15C is a front line US fighter, with presumably some equipment on board which the US would not want falling into the wrong hands, and the propensity for Russian forces to conduct patrols in the North Sea, I should think retrieving the wreckage will be a priority for the US beyond simply to the desire to find out what was the cause of the crash.

It could simply be a case of GLOC and nothing technical as the cause, but if it is an issue with the airframe, then learning about that ASAP will be a priority. I suspect that the forces probably know already what was behind it, since training exercises and all the communications related to this are closely monitored by AWACs, but whether we get to find out about this in the future depends on whether it is a matter of security as much as anything else. 

Whatever the cause, it is very sad to hear of this and it points up once again that since 'you train like you fight', just because there is no shooting war going on, people in the forces still put their lives on the line for us all, even in peacetime.