R.A.A.F. crew believed dead
NZPA-AAP Sydney The crew of a Royal Australian Air Force Fill strike jet that crashed into the sea off the New South Wales south coast on Tuesday is now officially presumed dead.
The search for the two men was called off at midday yesterday after examination of the plane’s wreckage, including parts of the emergency escape capsule, showed they could not have escaped alive.
An Air Force spokesman said that if the crew had ejected the escape capsule would not have disintegrated. The pilot was Flight Lieutenant Stephen Matthew Erskine, aged 24, single. His navigator was a United States Air Force exchange officer, Captain Gregory Spence Angell, aged 34, who was married.
An R.A.A.F. board of inquiry has been convened. It is believed the Fill plunged into the sea in flames about 10 p.m. on Tuesday while making a simulated attack on a Navy vessel during a joint Australia-New Zealand air force-navy training exercise.
Another Fill crew taking part in the exercise saw the aircraft on fire moments before it disappeared, and seconds later a brief mayday call was received by the R.A.A.F’s operations base at Richmond, north-west of Sydney.
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Press, 31 January 1986, Page 8
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194R.A.A.F. crew believed dead Press, 31 January 1986, Page 8
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