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2022 United States Navy F-35C Lightning accident

24 Jan 2022 · South China Sea

Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II

From an unrecorded airport to USS Carl Vinson,South China Sea

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Event

Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
Unknown
Event fatalities
Unknown
Ground fatalities
Unknown
Occupants
Unknown
Survivors
Unknown
InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
7
OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
Military

Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II

Category
Airplane · from aircraft type
RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
Unknown
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From not recordedTo USS Carl Vinson,South China Sea

Not plotted · Not plotted: the Wikipedia article gives no coordinates, and its site names no town or airport that matches exactly.

From the Wikipedia article

On 24 January 2022, during an exercise in the South China Sea, an F-35C belonging to the United States Navy crashed while landing on the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson (CVN-35), and apart from the pilot, 6 crew members serving on the ship were injured. The pilot safely exited the cockpit by means of the ejection seat and was recovered from the sea shortly afterwards. The wreckage of the aircraft sank into the water shortly afterwards.

Accident

According to a statement from the United States Navy, "An F-35C Lightning II serving on USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70), assigned to Carrier Air Wing (CVW) 2, experienced a mishap during landing in the course of routine flight operations and fell into the sea after damaging the flight deck (of the ship)." The pilot and two other sailors were taken to a medical facility in Manila, Philippines, and four sailors were treated by the medical personnel on the ship.

The accident is the second accident in the South China Sea in which the US military has been involved. In October 2021, the nuclear-powered submarine USS Connecticticut had struck an underwater mountain, injuring 11 crew and damaging its ballast tanks.

Translated into English with AI assistance from the Turkish Wikipedia article “2022 Amerika Birleşik Devletleri Donanması F-35C Lightning kazası” (revision 27682371, retrieved 2026-09-19) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out; the translation may contain errors, and long articles were cut to their first 700 words. Read the article

Sources

Turkish Wikipedia article: 2022 Amerika Birleşik Devletleri Donanması F-35C Lightning kazası
Article
2022 Amerika Birleşik Devletleri Donanması F-35C Lightning kazası
Translation
Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
Revision
27682371 · 2022-05-02 · retrieved 2026-09-19
Wikidata
Q118956477
Licence
Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
Where each value comes from
Record
tr Wikipedia article "2022 Amerika Birleşik Devletleri Donanması F-35C Lightning kazası" (page 3257222, revision 27682371), translated into English with AI assistance
Date
Wikipedia infobox: date
Place and country
Wikipedia infobox: site
Map position
none
Aircraft, operator and route
Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports)
Operation
operator named as an armed force or military unit in the infobox
Fatalities
not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
Ground fatalities
not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
Summary
Wikipedia article lead
Source notes (1)
  • Wikipedia · Facts from the Turkish Wikipedia article's infobox, translated into English with AI assistance, not checked against an investigation report. Independent review pending.