The Day the Sea Got a Free Super Hornet
A $60 million accident inspires silence, sarcasm, and an oil-smudged report.
A trail of scuffed paint marked where the Super Hornet had skidded before vanishing overboard — $60 million gone in one splash.
Dawson sat on a low crate nearby, grease-streaked and wide-eyed, his hands still clenched around an empty tow cable. He’d been there. Right there. Tow team. Front row. He hadn’t moved much since. Meanwhile, Miller stood near the edge, hands in his pockets, peering deep into the water. Junior aircraft handler by designation, Miller hadn’t seen the fall — but he’d heard it.
“You heard that, right?” he asked Dawson.
“Yeah,” Dawson said. “Hard to miss the sound of a 30,000-pound jet belly-flopping into the Red Sea.”
“That is a $60 million fighter.”
“Correction,” Dawson muttered. “Formerly a $60 million fighter.”
Miller let out a slow whistle. “How does a plane fall off an aircraft carrier? It wasn’t even active.”
“They were towing it across the hangar,” Dawson said, finally letting the cable drop beside him. “Truman pulled a hard left to dodge a missile, jet says ‘no thanks,’ and—” He made a vague gesture seaward. “It left.”
“That turn did this?”
“Sharp one,” Dawson replied. “Real ‘brace yourself and pray your tools don’t fly’ kind of turn. Plane rolled over and…sploosh.”
Miller rubbed his temple. “Why wasn’t it strapped down?”
“It was,” Dawson said, a little too defensively. “Until everything slipped, including the tow tractor.”
Miller stared. “What happened to the guy in the cockpit?”
“Jumped. Rolled. Sprained his ego and a couple vetebrae. He’s at the med bay.”
“And now we’re just... what? Out a jet?”
“Technically,” Dawson said, “it’s still there… in a deeper wetter hangar.”
Miller exhaled “This is going to be an absolute nightmare to write-up.”
“Not if we say it hydroplaned.”
Miller turned. “Off the side of a nuclear carrier?”
“I said say, not testify in court.”
He waited. “So what’s the official write-up?”
Dawson reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded slip of paper, already creased and smudged with oil. “‘Unexpected buoyancy event during evasive action.’”
Miller squinted. “Buoyancy? The thing sank like a vending machine full of anvils.”
“Yeah,” Dawson said. “But for like half a second... it was very buoyant.”
Miller groaned. “Someone’s definitely getting demoted.”
Real headlines that vaguely resemble today’s fiction:
https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/28/politics/us-navy-jet-overboard/index.html
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/04/28/navy-fighter-jet-red-sea/83333990007/
https://www.businessinsider.com/us-navy-aircraft-carrier-red-sea-lost-another-fighter-jet-2025-4
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