The Daily BS • Bo Snerdley Cuts Through It!
The Daily BS • Bo Snerdley Cuts Through It!

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Dashcam: Bloodied Marine pilot’s unique reaction to fiery F-18 crash he just walked away from

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BS BULLETIN:

  • Newly released bodycam shows a bloodied Marine pilot walking out of the woods after ejecting from an F/A-18 moments before it slammed into a Washington mountainside.
  • His first assessment of the wreckage: “That’s an F-18. Well, that was an F-18.”
  • Then came perhaps the calmest crash notification ever delivered: “Hey buddy, I just crashed.”

There is remaining calm under pressure, and then there is ejecting from a fighter jet, crashing through trees, emerging with blood covering your face and essentially reporting the loss of a $67 million aircraft like you backed the family Buick into the garage door.

Newly released bodycam footage from the Yakima County Sheriff’s Office captures the remarkable aftermath of a June 13 Marine F/A-18 Hornet crash near Washington state’s Rimrock Lake. The pilot survived after ejecting moments before the fighter slammed into a mountainside during a low-level training flight.

The footage itself is extraordinary.

The Marine emerges bloodied but walking, cellphone in hand, and calmly approaches a sheriff’s deputy. When asked what kind of aircraft had gone down, he starts with: “That’s an F-18.”

Then he takes another look at reality. “Well, that was an F-18.” That may be the most expensive use of the past tense in Marine Corps history.


The aircraft, assigned to Marine Aircraft Group 11, 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing, was conducting routine training near Rimrock Lake when something went badly wrong. The pilot told responders they had been performing circles over the lake and doing low-level training before he “tucked in” and encountered trouble.

“Honestly, I’m a little frazzled,” he admitted.

Considering he had just been forcibly separated from a multimillion-dollar fighter jet at high speed, we’ll allow it.

One witness told him, “You hit the trees bad, bud.” The Marine corrected him: “I went through the trees.”

The pilot acknowledged that he had “some adrenaline going,” but the video shows him remaining remarkably composed as deputies checked him over and helped retrieve equipment scattered through the woods. His parachute had become tangled in the trees, while his oxygen mask was recovered with blood on it. Military Times reported that his helmet bore the words “COME TO FIGHT COME TO WIN.”

After borrowing a phone, the Marine contacted his squadron and delivered the news without drama: “Hey buddy, I just crashed.”

No screaming. No theatrical explanation. Just: Hey buddy, little situation here. Airplane is now part of the mountain.

The crash sparked a wildfire in the wooded area, though local reporting says the fire was contained to only a few acres. Paramedics examined the pilot for relatively minor cuts to his face and hands before he was transported to a hospital.

The Marine eventually summed up his escape himself: “Without exaggeration: That’s about as close as you come.”

Indeed.

The Marine Corps has classified the incident as a non-fatal aviation mishap. The Hornet was destroyed, and a military spokesperson put its value at roughly $67 million. The exact cause remains under investigation by the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing, which has cautioned that aviation mishap investigations can take months.

MY QUICK TAKE

I have watched enough movies to know exactly how this scene is supposed to go.

Pilot ejects. Fighter jet explodes. Hero staggers from the forest. Cue dramatic music.

Instead, we got:

“That’s an F-18. Well, that was an F-18.” I love this guy.

Then somebody tells him he hit the trees pretty badly. His response? “I went through the trees.” Oh. Pardon us. Apparently the trees hit him.

And finally, the phone call every commanding officer dreams of receiving: “Hey buddy, I just crashed.”

I spill coffee and conduct a larger investigation.

There is something wonderfully Marine about the entire video. His face is bleeding. His parachute is hanging from a tree. Sixty-seven million dollars’ worth of Uncle Sam’s hardware is burning on a mountainside. And he’s standing there basically saying:

Yeah, I’m a little frazzled. Sir, you are authorized to be extremely frazzled. The aircraft can be replaced. The pilot cannot. And after watching him walk out of those woods, bloodied but upright, there’s only one appropriate conclusion: That was one very expensive good day.

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