Student Pilot Crashed and Killed

CNN.com
Pilot killed in F-16 combat training
* Story Highlights
* Aircraft goes down 80 miles northwest of Phoenix, Arizona
* Student pilot was practicing air-to-air combat with another F-16
* Rescuers find pilot's parachute and gear near impact crater
PARKER, Arizona (AP) -- The pilot of an F-16C fighter jet that crashed in a rugged area of western Arizona was killed when his plane went down, Air Force officials confirmed Saturday.

The student pilot was practicing air-to-air combat with another F-16 from Luke Air Force Base about noon Friday when his plane crashed, base spokeswoman Mary Jo May said.

Aircraft from the Air Force, Marines, Civil Air Patrol and Arizona Department of Public Safety spent hours trying to find the wreckage, which was spotted late Friday in a remote area about 80 miles northwest of Phoenix.

Rescuers could reach the site only by helicopter and arrived at daybreak Saturday, May said. They found the pilot's parachute and some of his gear about 150 feet from an impact crater. It took several hours for the Air Force to confirm that he had died in the crash.

The pilot, whose identity hasn't been released pending notification of relatives, was part of the 62nd Fighter Squadron, one of eight squadrons at the base. The base is in the Phoenix suburb of Glendale and is the world's largest F-16 training base with about 185 F-16s.

There have been 17 other crashes of Luke-based F-16s since 1998, and only one of those resulted in a fatality, May said. That crash happened in May 2004, when a pilot with the Singapore air force died after his jet went down during a training mission at an Air Force bombing range in southwest Arizona.

The most recent crashes came in 2006. A pilot ejected safely from an F-16 in April 2006 after the lone engine on the jet exploded just after takeoff from the base. The aircraft came down in a cornfield.

Nearly nine months later, a two-seat F-16 crashed during a training mission at the same range where the Singapore pilot died. The pilot and instructor bailed out safely.

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