Stop Feeding F/A-18 Hornets To The Red Sea No Matter How Hungry It Claims To Be

The USS Harry S. Truman lost an F/A-18 Super Hornet worth more than $60 million in the Red Sea on Tuesday, and no, you aren’t re-reading the same story from just over a week ago. The $60 million Hornet the Navy lost this time is different than the Hornet the Navy lost last time. Or maybe it would be more accurate to say the USS Truman lost a second Hornet in the Red Sea because, wouldn’t you know it, they both fell off the same boat, CNN reports. 

This time around, it’s a little less embarrassing for everyone involved, though. The previous Hornet was already parked on the USS Truman and simply fell off while the boat was turning, but according to two of CNN’s sources, “there was some kind of arrestment failure as the jet was trying to land on the carrier.” That’s still a big error, but landing a fighter jet on an aircraft carrier is a lot harder than it looks in the movies, and equipment does fail sometimes. 

Usually, that equipment failure doesn’t result in $60 million getting flushed down the toilet, but the good news is, the pilot and weapons systems officer were able to eject safely, and a rescue helicopter picked them up alive, with only minor injuries. You can always buy a new plane, but you can’t just go out and buy a new pilot. At least not yet. I wouldn’t be surprised if Peter Thiel is working on making the Star Wars clone army a reality, and now that Elon’s handed over all the data he needs to complete his panopticon, he’s probably got a lot more time to focus on perfecting his clones. 

While it’s notable that the same boat lost two Super Hornets so close together, Tuesday’s plane crash was actually the third Hornet the USS Truman lost in the last six months. Just before Christmas, while still in the Red Sea, the Truman lost a Hornet to friendly fire. As the War Zone reports, the Navy lost that Hornet to friendly fire when the USS Gettysburg shot it down. It wasn’t clear at the time why the USS Gettysburg fired on its own plane, but one U.S. official did tell the War Zone, “an investigation [was] underway to determine the facts and circumstances” surrounding the friendly fire incident. The pilot and weapons systems officer also ejected safely, though, and were rescued with only minor injuries.

In February, the USS Truman changed things up slightly, and, instead of losing yet another Super Hornet, collided with the Besiktas-M, a merchant ship, near Port Said, Egypt. Remarkably, no one aboard either boat reported any serious injuries. Still, the Navy doesn’t take kindly to people crashing its boats, and WHRO reports it fired Capt. Dave Snowden a week later and replaced him with Capt. Chris Hill, who previously captained the USS Eisenhower. 

While I don’t know much about boats or the military, it seems pretty clear to me that the USS Harry S. Truman is cursed. Where the curse came from and how to lift it are a lot less clear, but just to be safe, they should probably send it back to Georgia and park it in Kings Bay until they can get more answers from a witch. I’d like to think Savannah witches can handle one cursed boat, but if not, New Orleans isn’t far away. Either way, it’s probably best to stop feeding $60 million Super Hornets to the Red Sea.