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One dead as US F-18 crashes in UK


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The aircraft came down 5 NM North West of Lakenheath, in farmland at Redmere, near Shippea Hill.

 

The pilot had ejected and he, and his open parachute, were found around 1.5 NM from the wreckage site. The alarm was raised at 10:30 BST today, by a local farmer. The farmer was alerted by an explosion and "fireball"

 

The aircraft was one of six returning home to the USA via Lakenheath, from flying sorties in Syria.

 

Unsurprisingly, the USAF have not yet indicated whether the pilot ejected too late, or any other tech details to the media at present.Lakenheath is a combined RAF / USAF base

 

article-3282653-2DA1F08200000578-927_308x370.jpg.c6b5da61f7891ad567b757257289f2f9.jpg Wreckage strewn over a large area.

 

Source : Daily Mail Online ( sorry I'm a bit late with this, just got back from work ! Thanks for the original post Robbo )

 

Pilot named as John Gillespie Magee Jnr, USMC ( Marines ) USAF don't fly FA 18s apparently > Info from my friend in New York 5 mins ago - been on national news there ( Geeze, I hope he was right . . otherwise I'll never trust him - or my inbox, again ! )

 

 

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Since I posted this,. . .the DM website has been updated several times, with lots of additional photos ( only two when I posted ) anyone can go and have a look at the Daily Mail online site, so I won't blather on about it.

 

But if you read the comments section on this subject,. . .there's a right slanging match going on between er,. . .other worldly sympathisers + UK and USA posters, for the last 8 hours or so. . .I don't post on there but some of the comments are hilariously weird !

 

 

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Reading that article, there are lots of contradictions - not surprising in a newspaper report. At the top it refers to a F18, and has a photo of a F18, but near the bottom of the atricle it refers to a F15. It also says there was one fatality, but the pilot ejected safely and no-one on the ground was injured. Great reporting.

 

 

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the atricle it refers to a F15. It also says there was one fatality, but the pilot ejected safely and no-one on the ground was injured.

Red.. that last paragraph refers to an F15 crash in early October 2014 where the crew member survived.

 

 

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Reading that article, there are lots of contradictions - not surprising in a newspaper report. At the top it refers to a F18, and has a photo of a F18, but near the bottom of the atricle it refers to a F15. It also says there was one fatality, but the pilot ejected safely and no-one on the ground was injured. Great reporting.

Sorry Red,. . .but the pilot was killed on impact post ejection. . .dunno whee you got that from. . . .

 

But this is the fog of warplanes. . . . . .

 

No problem. . . . we'll find out more if the USAF tell us. . . . .

 

 

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"Lakenheath is a combined RAF / USAF base"All US airfields in the UK are titled 'RAF'. I'm unaware of the RAF having any presence at Lakenheath, unless it's something quite recent.

They (normally ) have - or used to have, an RAF liaison officer of fairly high rank at both Mildenhall and Lakenheath, which are less than 4 NM apart. The RAF officer has no operational jurisdiction. Whether they do this now, I am not sure, but some years back we had an organised club visit to EGUN ( Mildenhall ) and the RAF L/O gave us a very interesting talk on how the place worked, ( refuelling wing ) including ATC procedures, with particular accent upon relationship with civilian / private traffice near their zones. There is a tiny gap which allows "Us" to pass betwen the zones enroute, to save diverting. Mildenhall usually carries out the communications for both bases. I have flown through this gap several times enroute to small airfields on the East coat.

 

Both of their MATZ ( military Air Traffic Zones ) do not actually require permission to fly though the outer parts of the zones, but it would be a very silly pilot who did not bother as they are both very active H24 with high speed traffic.

 

250px-RAF_Mildenhall_Logo.jpg.43bdcddb9cebdd8ebffc8e19186e429a.jpg

 

Incidentally, when we visited Mildenhall, there were seven RAF Tornado aircraft, and a couple of RAF Hercs parked there ( not allowed to ask why ! )

 

 

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