It was “a mistake”: the American cruiser USS Gettysburg shoots down a fighter plane carrying the two navy pilots

An F/A-18 fighter jet. Sweder Breet on Unsplash – Illustration

he guided missile cruiser USS Gettysburg “mistakenly fired (…) and hit” an F/A-18 fighter jet carrying the two U.S. Navy pilots who had taken off from the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman.

Two U.S. Navy pilots survived the destruction of their plane Sunday over the Red Sea, shot down “by mistake” by a missile fired from a U.S. cruiser, the military announced. “Initial analyses indicate that one of the crew members was slightly injured”, the U.S. Central Command for the Middle East (Centcom) reported in a statement. “The incident was not the result of hostile fire,”, the military described, and an investigation was opened for “suspected friendly fire.”.

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According to Centcom, the guided-missile cruiser USS Gettysburg “mistakenly fired (…) and hit” an F/A-18 fighter jet carrying the two U.S. Navy pilots who had taken off from the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman.

Multinational naval coalition

The United States has set up a multinational naval coalition in the region in response to attacks carried out for months off the coast of Yemen by Houthi rebels, which are disrupting traffic in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, a maritime zone essential for world trade.

The rebels, who control large swathes of Yemen and are backed by Iran, are targeting ships they believe to be linked to Israel, saying act in solidarity with the Palestinians in the context of the war in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas. These attacks have prompted Washington to strike rebel targets in Yemen, sometimes with the help of the United Kingdom.

On Saturday, the United States claimed to have shot down Houthi military installations in the Yemeni capital, Sanaa, a few hours after a strike, claimed by the rebels, which left 16 people lightly injured in central Israel. Rebel drones and cruise missiles were also shot down over the Red Sea, according to Centcom.