Search continues for 7 crew after 2 SDF choppers crash in Pacific

The search continued on Monday for seven missing Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force members after two helicopters crashed during a late-night anti-submarine drill in the Pacific on Saturday, with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida vowing an "all-out" rescue effort, Kyodo reports.

The Defense Ministry is analyzing two flight recorders that were recovered from an area where the search is taking place, but there has so far been no data indicating an abnormality in either of the helicopters, Defense Ministry Minoru Kihara told reporters.

The two SH-60K patrol helicopters, which the Defense Ministry believes likely collided, were carrying four people each, with one confirmed to have died on Sunday.

"It is a matter of greatest regret that we lost a valued (MSDF) member during difficult nighttime exercises to prepare for missions," Kishida told a parliamentary committee on Monday.

"Taking this serious incident into our heart, we will take all possible measures to ensure the safe operations of Self-Defense Forces aircraft," he said.

Kihara said he issued an order on Sunday to the SDF to carefully conduct preflight checks on all aircraft, carry out safety management education and confirm emergency procedures.

In the latest incident, the helicopters lost contact at 10:38 p.m. and 11:04 p.m. on Saturday, respectively, with the MSDF receiving an emergency signal at 10:39 p.m.

Together with another MSDF helicopter, the two crashed aircraft were conducting a drill to detect and attack a submarine, after taking off from separate destroyers deployed nearby.

The crash site is in waters around 270 kilometers east of Torishima Island in the Izu Island chain, where the water depth is about 5,500 meters.

Rotor blades and other helicopter parts have been spotted on the surface as well as helmets.

Adm. Ryo Sakai, chief of staff of the MSDF, said the exact locations of the main wreckage of the helicopters are still unknown, but acknowledged that "common sense" would suggest that they have sunk deep down in the sea.

The accident is a blow to the Japanese Self-Defense Forces, which in April 2023 saw a UH-60JA helicopter of the ground force crash into waters off an island in the southern prefecture of Okinawa, resulting in the deaths of all 10 people aboard.

In January 2022, an Air Self-Defense Force F-15 fighter jet crashed into the Sea of Japan off Ishikawa Prefecture in the central part of the country, killing two pilots.