REUTERS/Stringer
- An unspecified Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) fighter jet crashed Tuesday in Hainan, a southern Chinese province in the South China Sea, the Associated Press reported.
- Both pilots were reportedly killed in the crash, but there were no injuries or fatalities on the ground.
- The accident is currently under investigation.
A Chinese fighter jet crashed in southern China Tuesday, killing the two pilots on board, Chinese media reports.
The unspecified fighter went down in Ledong County, Hainan Province, a southern Chinese island located in the South China Sea, the Associated Press reported, citing the official PLA Daily. The country has set up military outposts in the region to enforce its sovereignty claims over the contested waterway.
There were reportedly no casualties on the ground.
The following video purportedly shows the crash site in Hainan:
Like the US military, which has also witnessed a high number of accidents in recent years, plane crashes are not uncommon for the Chinese military.
Last year, at least a dozen crew members of a People’s Liberation Army aircraft were reportedly killed when the plane, either a refueling aircraft or an electronic reconnaissance aircraft, crashed in Guizhou, a province in southwestern China, the South China Morning Post reported at the time.
Two years earlier in 2016, Yu Xu, one of China’s first female fighter pilots, was killed in an unfortunate training accident. That same year, a Chinese navy fighter jet crashed into a factory in Taizhou, a city in eastern China.
Over the years, Chinese military aircraft have also crashed in residential areas, injuring civilians living in the area.
There have also been multiple accidents, some fatal, some not, involving the J-15, a derivative of a Soviet prototype that serves as China’s only carrier-based fighter.
Tuesday’s plane crash is currently under investigation.
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See Also:
- US commander warns hazardous Chinese military activity is on the rise in the South China Sea
- The US sent a B-52 bomber through the South China Sea for the first time in months
- A close ally is terrified the US will drag it into a ‘shooting war’ with China in the South China Sea
Source: Business Insider – rpickrell@businessinsider.com (Ryan Pickrell)