Feb. 12 (UPI) — Two Navy pilots were rescued Wednesday morning after they ejected from their E/A-18 G Growler fighter jet that crashed into San Diego Bay, authorities said.
San Diego Fire Rescue said it responded at 10:17 a.m. local time and assigned 60 personnel to the scene.
They were rescued by a sport fishing charter after being in the water only for a minute, the U.S. Coast Guard said. They were taken to a U.S. Customs and Border Protection boat and then went to University of California San Diego Health in Hillcrest, where they initially were reported in stable condition, KGTV reported.
The two-seater jet, which specializes in electronic warfare, was based at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island in Washington state and was approaching Naval Air Station North Island in a test flight, USNI News reported. It is part of the Nimitz Carrier Strike Group.
The crash was east of the San Diego base on a rainy and misty morning
Justin Eaves, a vacationer, said he saw the jet crash into the bay after hearing it go over his motel near Shelter Island.
“It did a couple of maneuvers,” Eaves told OnScene TV, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune. “You could hear it when it went over the motel and then it was kind of quiet and then it kicked up again.
“And all of a sudden, a few seconds later, I just saw the plane going straight down into the water,” he said.
The plane didn’t hit any buildings on Shelter Island.
“Thank God that nobody — all this stuff right over here that plane could have hit,” he said. “Luckily it didn’t. [It was] very fortunate.”
The first Growler test aircraft flew in August 2006. It is a variant in the F/A-18.
