Disaster in Australia: 15 soldiers rescued in VTOL crash

Bad luck in Australia
15 soldiers rescued after VTOL crash

8/28/2023 7:23 am

During a training exercise in Australia, a US military aircraft crashed in the northern part of the country. Three soldiers were killed and 8 were seriously injured. Rescue workers have now taken the survivors to safety.

A US military aircraft crashes during maneuvers in Australia, killing three and seriously injuring eight, while the rest of the aircraft are largely unharmed. Officials said 15 missing sailors have been found. They suffered minor injuries or were uninjured.

Northern Territory police chief Michael Murphy described the scene of the crash as “dense bushland”. Speaking to local media, he said rescue operations in the hard-to-reach area benefited from the airstrip’s proximity. As a result, thanks to well-coordinated rescue efforts, some of the injured may have been treated sooner – “which may have saved some lives”.

Three soldiers were killed and eight Marines were seriously injured in an accident on a remote island in the country’s north on Sunday, a US military spokesman said. A total of 23 people were on board the V-22 Osprey when it crashed for initially unclear reasons. The accident took place on Melville Island, 60 kilometers north of Australia. The rescue mission was complicated by the sparsely populated island’s remote location.

According to initial findings during the investigation into the cause of the crash, Darwin Airport air traffic control relayed messages from the crash site. There was talk of dark smoke and “significant fires”.

The V-22 Osprey has already had several fatal accidents

The plane that crashed was taking part in “Predator’s Run”, a large-scale military exercise involving thousands of soldiers from the US and Australia, as well as troops from Indonesia and the Philippines. Northern Australia has recently become a key area for US military training as China’s influence in the region grows.

The V-22 Osprey looks like a hybrid between an airplane and a helicopter, and can take off and land vertically like a helicopter, while flying significantly faster than normal helicopters. In recent years there have been many accidents caused by machinery. Last November, four US Marines were killed when a V-22B Osprey crashed during a NATO exercise in Norway.

In 2017, three US marines died in a failed landing maneuver on a ship off the northern coast of Australia, and in 2000, 19 marines were killed in an accident during a training exercise in the US state of Arizona. In the spring, due to a series of security incidents, the US military called in all non-essential pilots for additional training.