Braxton Taylor
The USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier lost another F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jet on Tuesday — the third since it deployed to the Middle East — this time amid a landing incident that caused the jet to go overboard, defense officials confirmed to Military.com
The incident comes just more than a week after the Truman lost an F/A-18 jet and a connected tow tractor when the pair fell overboard while being towed around the carrier’s hangar deck.
Officials said the most recent incident was caused by a failure in some part of the arresting equipment used to bring the jet to a halt on the carrier’s flight deck, and both aviators ejected safely from the aircraft.
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The pair of sailors were recovered by a rescue helicopter and found to have minor injuries, the defense officials said.
Separately, one defense official confirmed to Military.com that the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels fired at the Truman carrier on Tuesday as well — despite claims of a brokered ceasefire from the White House that began Monday.
“They’ve announced to us, at least, that they don’t want to fight anymore,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday. “We will stop the bombings, and they have capitulated.”
However, it was unclear whether the jet falling overboard was related to the incoming fire. It was also unclear if the arresting equipment failure was with the arresting wire that is designed to stop an aircraft during a carrier landing or with the hook on the fighter not catching on the wire.
In last week’s incident, a U.S. official confirmed to Military.com that initial reports indicated the Truman made a hard turn to evade Houthi fire, which contributed to the fighter jet falling overboard. Under the Trump administration, more officials have been reluctant to speak on the record using their names, even in cases of standard day-to-day military events or incidents that would have been directly attributed in the past.
CNN was the first outlet to report the story of Tuesday’s jet loss.
Military.com reached out to the Navy for comment on its sailors and equipment, but the service referred questions on the incident to U.S. Central Command, which oversees the operations in the region.
In December, the USS Gettysburg, a Navy cruiser, downed another F/A-18 fighter jet from the Truman in a friendly fire incident. That jet’s two aviators were also forced to eject, and one suffered minor injuries.
The jets in the most recent incident and the friendly fire belonged to Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 11. The jet that rolled off the deck last week was from VFA 136.
An individual F/A-18 fighter jet costs between $60 million and $70 million, depending on the configuration.
To lose three fighter jets on a single deployment is incredibly unusual, but Truman’s deployment, which began in September of last year, also featured a collision with another ship.
On Feb. 12, the Navy revealed the Truman had collided with a merchant vessel roughly half its size, the Besiktas-M, just before midnight local time while sailing near Port Said, Egypt, in the Mediterranean Sea.
The city, which sits at the northern opening to the Suez Canal, is an area of dense maritime traffic, with ships coming in and out of the canal, as well as others waiting to begin their transit.
As a result of the incident, the Navy fired the ship’s commanding officer and ordered a port visit to Souda Bay, Crete, for repairs.
On Tuesday, officials in the Pentagon could not say when the Truman is set to return home.
In 2022, the USS Harry S. Truman also lost an F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jet in the waters of the Mediterranean when the jet was blown overboard “due to unexpected heavy weather” as the ship was conducting an at-sea resupply.
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