Bodies of 2 pilots of crashed F-15 found in Sea of Japan

Failed ejection? Didn't eject? Wow, a Colonel too. In the USAF a squadron commander would be a Major or maybe a Lieutenant Col and a colonel would be a wing commander.

No ejection from either pilot, takeoff after 5:30 PM (I.e. dark), unlikely they would have been doing any heavy maneuvering. My bet is a loss of situational awareness for whatever reason and CFIT - controlled flight into terrain (Or water in this case). Tragic, but a reminder to aviators to keep your IFR skills polished to the highest standard at all times.

Spatial disorientation, from the sounds of it.

As usual, when facts are few, experts are many.

R I P

As usual, when facts are few, experts are many.

Well not sure what else would cause them to auger in without ejecting.

The only media I saw covering this since it happened was China Uncensored on youtube. Japan & US media share at least one thing - myopia. The difference is the US covers everything it thinks worth covering 100x more that it’s worth covering.

Top skilled and no ejection attempt? OK, we don’t know it so well as civilians and also 5 km from the coast the altitude is maybe still such low, that an ejection doesn’t make much sense too and you pray for softer horizontal crash and then some miles of swimming. Reasons can also be some private problems , a severe disease prognosis, scolding from upper charges before the flight leading to stress or even suicide attempt. We don’t know it and won’t learn it too. In doubt, the F-15 was outdated, badly maintained or full of principle errors.

I visited Komatsu Air Base twice on open days, enjoyed very much F-15s flights. What a loss. RIP to the pilots, condolences to the families.

The only media I saw covering this since it happened was China Uncensored on youtube. Japan & US media share at least one thing - myopia. 

Are you kidding? Japanese news outlets were covering it all week and even had a 15 minute special on the Advanced Tactical Training “Aggressor” group.

Col Tanaka was a former Blue Impulse team leader, and chief instructor of the Aggressor group. -A group of hand-picked best-of-the-best fighter pilots. So human error seems unlikely.

Top skilled and no ejection attempt? OK, we don’t know it so well as civilians and also 5 km from the coast the altitude is maybe still such low, that an ejection doesn’t make much sense too and you pray for softer horizontal crash and then some miles of swimming.

A trained military pilot will always eject if the aircraft becomes unflyable. It is drilled into you to not try to save the aircraft, save your life. It takes too long to unstrap and climb out of one of those things to risk a controlled ditch, and especially so at night. A one kilometer swim in full flight gear is pretty arduous. You are wearing 25 or 30kg of stuff. Swimming with the floatation collars inflated is tough too. No, if you know the plane is going down you punch out and rely on your safety equipment including the raft that drops down out of the bottom of the ejection seat. Yes, I was once ejection seat qualified.

We may never know all the facts in this case, but one thing that is for certain is that accidents are a major cause of deaths for flight crews. That is why training is so important. It is ironic that they were engaged in training when they died.