Sunday, South Carolina military officials issued an official statement regarding the loss of an F-35B Lightning Jet II fighter aircraft. The aircraft vanished during the course of its flight, prompting officials to appeal to the general public for assistance in locating it.
It is necessary to be skeptical when evaluating official announcements. In this scenario, it is possible for us to express astonishment or concern regarding the unaccounted-for aircraft and specific aspects that government officials neglected to emphasize.
According to a report from the entertainment news website MEAWW, the aircraft became unaccounted for on Sunday at approximately 2:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time when the pilot initiated ejection in an indeterminate location over North Charleston, South Carolina for unknown reasons.
Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort received the F-35B aircraft.
After an anomalous ejection, Joint Base Charleston issued a public call for assistance.
Joint Base Charleston issued a statement on X, formerly known as Twitter, urging “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.”
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
Obviously, the military refrained from disseminating exhaustive information via social media.
According to Jeremy Huggins, the spokesperson for Joint Base Charleston, the transponder of the aircraft was not functioning “for some reason that we haven’t yet determined,” and “that’s why we put out the public request for help.”
Similarly, the F-35B is capable of evading detection under normal conditions.
According to Huggins, “The aircraft is stealth, so it has different coatings and different designs that make it more difficult than a normal aircraft to detect.”
According to a military-focused news source, The War Zone, aircraft that have been abandoned by their pilots while in flight have demonstrated the ability to autonomously traverse significant distances using autopilot systems, and in some cases have survived the impact of a crash landing.
In 1970, for instance, a U.S. Air Force F-106 Delta Dart effectively landed in a cornfield following the ejection of its pilot. Similarly, in 1988, a Soviet MiG-23 aircraft flew from Poland to Belgium without its pilot, who had initiated ejection shortly after the flight’s takeoff.
According to The War Zone, the modern F-35B aircraft has “considerable range,” allowing it to conceivably travel vast distances while on automatic.
The location of the aircraft remained unclear for more than 24 hours. On Monday, however, the jet’s wreckage was discovered in a debris field roughly two hours northeast of Joint Base Charleston.
Unsurprisingly, social media platforms displayed skepticism regarding why it took so long to locate.
According to a report by MEAWW, a number of users hypothesized as potential causes everything from enigmatic flying objects (UFOs) to the deep state.
One user expressed skepticism on Monday, suggesting that it was “Hilarious to read that a F-35 has gone for a joy ride. Conspiracy theory time – 1. It’s actually a crashed UFO and government is creating a cover story 2. Bomber has been given to Ukraine and this bs story to cover the tracks.”
Hilarious to read that a F-35 has gone for a joy ride.
Conspiracy theory time –
1. It's actually a crashed UFO and government is creating a cover story
2. Bomber has been given to Ukraine and this bs story to cover the tracks.— @N0ty0ur0pinion (@N0ty0ur0pinion) September 18, 2023
The potential loss of an F-35B aircraft, which is currently unaccounted for and most likely involved in an accident, may appear relatively insignificant in light of the military’s extensive history of overspending and asset loss.
On September 10, 2001, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld made a notable public statement regarding a subsequent incident at the Pentagon.
Rumsfeld stated that “According to some estimates we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions.” Naturally, the subsequent events served to obscure the narrative while engendering a plethora of conspiracy theories that endured for several decades.
The narrative at hand includes not only the financial inefficiency caused by the lost aircraft, but also the incremental dissemination of relevant information.
In the initial Joint Base Charleston communication, the public was asked to “help our recovery teams locate the F-35.” Notably absent was any mention of a scenario in which the aircraft may have sustained autonomous navigation for a considerable distance.
Tuesday, the Associated Press reported the discovery of the aircraft:
The crash site for a stealth fighter jet that went missing during the weekend after its pilot ejected was located Monday in rural South Carolina after the military asked the public for help finding an aircraft built to elude detection.
The debris field was discovered in Williamsburg County, about two hours northeast of Joint Base Charleston. Residents were being asked to avoid the area while a recovery team worked to secure it.
“We are transferring incident command to the USMC this evening, as they begin the recovery process,” the base posted Monday on the X social media platform.
Authorities had been searching for the jet since the pilot, whose name hasn’t been released, parachuted to safety into a North Charleston neighborhood about 2 p.m. Sunday. He was taken to a hospital, where he was in stable condition, Marines Maj. Melanie Salinas said.
“The mishap is currently under investigation, and we are unable to provide additional details to preserve the integrity of the investigative process,” the Marine Corps said in a news release on Monday evening.
The Marine Corps announced earlier Monday it was pausing aviation operations for two days after the fighter jet’s crash — the third costly accident in recent weeks.