The wreckage of a Japanese F-35A stealth fighter that went missing on Tuesday was located by search and rescue teams in the Pacific Ocean on Wednesday, authorities said. However, the pilot is yet to be found.
The F-35A was the first to be assembled in Japan by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. Japan intends to order a total of 147 F-35 fighters from the US. The Japan Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF) fighter was on a routine training mission 135km east of the Misawa air base in Amomori Prefecture when it stopped appearing on radar about half an hour into its flight.
Japan’s minister of defense, Takeshi Iwaya, told reporters that the pilot’s last transmission before contact was lost was “Stop training”. According to Japan's public broadcaster NHK, the pilot was a male in his 40s.
Following the disappearance, the JASDF grounded its remaining 12 F-35A fighters. Amid fears that the advanced stealth aircraft would be recovered by Russia or China, the Japan Self-Defense Forces had deployed naval and aerial assets to recover the plane, with the US military also involved in the search.
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The crash is only the second of an F-35—the other took place in September 2018 when an F-35B short take-off and vertical landing aircraft of the US Marine Corps crashed over South Carolina. Then, the pilot ejected to safety.
The Lockheed Martin F-35A is the conventional take-off variant of the F-35 programme, and is the lightest and most nimble version of the fighter. The F-35B can take off and land vertically. Both jets are stealthy multi-role aircraft, part of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) project comprising NATO members and US allies. A single F-35 aircraft is estimated to cost 10 billion yen or roughly $90 million.
