- The tilt-rotor Osprey aircraft has a troubled history, with a string of fatal crashes over the years.
- Four months ago, a plane crash in northern Australia killed three US Marines among the 23 on board.
A United States Osprey military aircraft with eight crew members on board crashed on Wednesday off the coast of Japan, the coastguard said.
“We received information at 2:47 pm (0547 GMT) today that the US military’s Osprey crashed off Yakushima Island,” a spokeswoman told a news agency.
“We were also notified that eight crew members were on board,” she added.
“There is no further information at the moment.”
However, no casualty has been reported.
The island of Yakushima lies south of Japan’s southernmost main island, Kyushu.
Japanese broadcaster NHK reported that the Osprey departed from the Iwakuni US base in the Yamaguchi region and headed for the Kadena base in Okinawa.
NHK also cited defence ministry sources as saying that the aircraft was a CV-22 Osprey belonging to Tokyo’s US Yokota air base.
The tilt-rotor Osprey aircraft has a troubled history, with a string of fatal crashes over the years.
Four months ago, a plane crash in northern Australia killed three US Marines among the 23 on board.
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