Three personnel still missing after Navy transport plane crashes off Japan

Three military personnel are still missing after a Navy aircraft crashed southeast of Okinawa, Japan this afternoon.

At approximately 2:45 p.m. Japan Standard Time, a C2-A aircraft with 11 crew and passengers onboard crashed into the ocean approximately 500 nautical miles southeast of Okinawa.

“The aircraft was conducting a routine transport flight carrying passengers and cargo from Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni to USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76),” the Commander of the Navy’s  Task Force 70 Public Affairs  said in a statement.

Reagan is currently operating in the Philippine Sea as part of an exercise with JMSDF.

The Navy was able to recover eight of the eleven personnel at 3:23 p.m. during rescue operations. The downed C2-A Greyhound aircraft was assigned to the “Providers” of Fleet Logistics Support Squadron Three Zero, Detachment Five, forward deployed in NAF Atsugi, Japan.

It is responsible for the transport of high-priority cargo, mail, duty passengers and Distinguished Visitors between USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76) and shore bases throughout the Western Pacific and Southeast Asia theaters.

The incident is under investigation.

The Navy has lost 17 sailors in the Pacific this year. Ten Sailors were killed when the destroyer USS John S. McCain and a merchant ship off Singapore in August. Another seven were killed when the guided-missile destroyer USS Fitzgerald collided with a cargo ship off Japan in June.

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