If you've ever wondered the surest way to destroy a hugely expensive piece of critical military equipment, well, now you have the answer:
A $14 million fighter jet engine was irreparably damaged after an engineer left a flashlight inside the engine, sealed it up and turned it on, a military investigation has revealed.
The accident happened at Luke Air Force base in Glendale, Arizona, in March 2023, on a plane with the 56th Fighter Wing.
We know from historical experience that it's simply a really bad idea to put one piece of machinery inside another machine's engine. It just doesn't work out.
(I mean I guess you didn't really need historical experience for that one.)
The F-35 jet was undergoing a routine check of its propulsion system, and a metering plug was inserted into an engine fuel line.
The addition of the plug was mandated across the Air Force's F-35 fleet to fix an issue discovered after a mishap with the fuel system in December 2022. The F-35 was 'one of the last aircraft that needed to be completed,' according to the report.
If you're not familiar with the F-35, it is notoriously unreliable. I think of Han Solo trying desperately to keep the Millennium Falcon flying every time they come to mind.
Despite being our newest fighter and despite sinking trillions of our tax dollars into the program, only half of our F-35s are even operable at any given time because of all the maintenance issues. The general leading the F-35 program has even labelled the issue "the war on readiness" because we're spending billions on repairs for fighters that aren't able to get off the ground.
(Have we mentioned that we're going to lose a major war?)
I mention this because there is a particular irony in the fact that the jet in this story was destroyed by an engineer trying desperately to keep it flightworthy.
After the mechanic's team sealed up the F-35, they let it run for several minutes. "None of the warning sirens sounded," but...
...when they shut the engine off, the engineers heard a clanging sound.
Needless to say, they discovered the flashlight eventually. The damage "was calculated at $4 million, meaning the entire $14 million engine needed to be scrapped."
And what about the hapless repairman who left the flashlight inside the multimillion-dollar engine? Well, the military isn't saying:
Any administrative actions taken regarding the F-35 incident on 15 March are not releasable.
I'm sure they gave the guy a stern talking-to!
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