THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, June 5, 1996 TAG: 9606050362
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: HONOLULU LENGTH: 91 lines
A mechanical problem may have caused a Japanese destroyer, aiming at a target being towed by a U.S. attack bomber during war games, to instead shoot the plane out of the sky, a Japanese navy official said.
The two U.S. Navy aviators aboard the aircraft ejected and were rescued by the Japanese vessel Yuugiri, which had shot them down with a burst of fire from its American-made anti-missile system.
On Tuesday, U.S. and Japanese officials halted the use of live ammunition by the ships until an investigation is completed. The incident involved an A-6E Intruder towing a target with a cable that stretched at least 2 miles.
The incident happened 1,600 miles west of Hawaii at 7:15 p.m. HST Monday (1:15 a.m. EDT Tuesday).
The pilot, Lt. Cmdr. William Royster, of Kansas City, Mo., and bombardier-navigator Lt. Keith Douglas of Birmingham, Ala., were rescued minutes after the Intruder hit the water. Royster was in good condition following surgery for facial lacerations, and Douglas was treated for superficial abrasions and returned to duty, Lt. Cmdr. Jeff Alderson, a U.S. Pacific Fleet spokesman, said.
``They're in very good shape,'' Cmdr. Keith Arterburn, another spokesman for the U.S. Pacific Fleet, said from Pearl Harbor. ``We're very, very happy that no one was seriously injured in the accident.''
The Yuugiri and the U.S. aircraft carrier Independence, which launched the plane, were participating in a multinational training exercise known as the Rim of the Pacific war games. South Korea, Chile, Australia and Canada were also taking part in the exercise, which is held every two years.
Japanese military and diplomatic officials conveyed their regrets to U.S. officials in Hawaii and Tokyo. Kazuya Natsukawa, chief of the Japanese naval forces, said an investigation is under way.
President Clinton received a written report on the accident and accepted the ``gracious expression of regret,'' White House spokesman Mike McCurry said.
U.S. military officials described the shooting Tuesday as accidental and said they plan no protest to the Japanese government. ``It was an unfortunate accident; accidents happen,'' said Lt. Jeff Davis, another spokesman for the Pacific Fleet. ``This is not something to get mad about.''
Toshinori Yanagiya, a Japanese Defense Ministry official who directs military training, said at a news conference in Tokyo that mechanical failure may have been a cause of the accident. ``We must at once find the cause of the incident and make sure it does not happen again,'' Foreign Ministry spokesman Hiroshi Hashimoto told reporters.
In Japan, defense officials, unhappy with the notion that their forces could not distinguish between a friendly warplane and a target towed far behind it, said that the American-made gun was supposed to be programmed so it could not shoot down the plane, but that something had gone wrong.
The Phalanx system aboard the Japanese ship was manufactured by General Dynamics, and is capable of firing nearly 3,000 rounds a minute.
The weapon can be set on a hair trigger making it capable of firing two seconds after a target is detected. It is intended to protect ships from missile attacks.
This is the second time in recent months that the Japanese military has accidentally shot down a plane. Last November, one U.S.-made Japanese F-15 fighter shot down another in exercises off Japan's west coast, when a Sidewinder air-to-air missile was accidentally fired.
While American and Japanese naval officials insisted that the incident was an accident, it could still have a political cost to the Japanese government, both as a reminder that Japanese naval ships are involved in live-fire exercises in the Pacific, and from the uncomfortable symbolism of a Japanese attack on an American plane in the vicinity of Hawaii.
``The Japanese pacifists will have a field day with this,'' said a Pentagon official. ``They remember Pearl Harbor better than we do.''
However, early today no protests had surfaced in Japan, and Japanese experts said there was no reason to believe that the incident would affect Japanese participation in these joint exercises.
The Japanese constitution, written by U.S. occupiers after World War II, limits its military to defensive purposes - the military is known as the Japan Self-Defense Forces.
A military spokesman said conducting joint practice maneuvers in foreign waters is sanctioned by the U.S.-Japan security alliance and within the constraints of the constitution. MEMO: The Associated Press, The Washington Post, the Seattle
Post-Intelligencer and The New York Times contributed to this report.
PILOT ONLINE: A Navy Web site details the Rim of the Pacific war games.
See the News page at http://www.pilotonline.com/ ILLUSTRATION: [Photos]
THE PLANE
THE GUN
THE SHIP by CNB