Oops, looks like US military officials have a real dilemma on their hands. In fact, this should make us all a little worried about our military’s security. On Sunday, September 17 during the middle of the afternoon a shocking incident occurred at a Charleston, South Carolina Air Force base.
An $80 million dollar Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II jet was reported missing after its pilot ejected from the cockpit. The U.S. military is now asking for the public’s help in locating the jet and have asked anyone with knowledge of its whereabouts to contact Joint Base Charleston (JB Charleston) Defense Operations Center at 843-963-3600.
US military officials are panicking after they lost an F-35.
"They don’t know where it is and are asking the public for help." pic.twitter.com/20eU7iQRvh
— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) September 18, 2023
Joint Base Charleston has posted on Facebook that they are searching for the F-35 and are working with Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort to locate it.
Based on the jet’s last known position, they are focusing their attention north of JB Charleston around Lake Moultrie and Lake Marion which together cover over 150,000 acres – mostly unincorporated land – and surround hundreds of individuals while nearby communities number in the few thousands.
No report of an explosion or collision with manmade structures has been reported as of yet.
The F-35 Lightning II is no ordinary aircraft – it’s the most expensive ever produced by the U.S., costing a staggering $1.7 trillion over its lifetime according to estimates by U.S Department of Defense officials .
It is said that no more than 220 jets can be built per year according to Lockheed Martin who produces them, but millions more will be invested into developing better technologies for these jets over time thanks to their advanced sensors, information fusion and network connectivity capabilities.
These technologies enable them to simultaneously engage ground and air targets as well as gather intelligence which can then be shared with other platforms making it an exceptionally capable fighter jet indeed.
Maybe they should also tag on a tracker for future reference, so an incident like this doesn’t happen again?
