Pentagon believes it has identified reason behind Osprey crash that killed 8 US Air Force members

The Pentagon thinks it has found the technical malfunction that caused an Osprey plane to crash fatally in Japan and cause the fleet to be grounded for two months. How to get the aircraft back into operation is now being considered. Navy Rear Adm. Chris Engdahl was quoted as saying by The Associated Press that the chairman of the Joint Safety Council and commander of Naval Safety Command, the Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps are currently collaborating with the Joint Safety Council at the Pentagon on their preparations to prepare Osprey crews for flight again. The officer with the authority to identify the mechanical breakdown refrained from disclosing the nature of the malfunction. Because mitigations can be implemented, it has made return to flight conversations possible. The official spoke under anonymity because they were not permitted to publicly discuss the probe. The council is in discussions with “commanders across the services on what are their plans to come back to flight, what are their risk decisions,” according to Engdahl, although each service will decide when it returns its own fleets to the air. “This has been done in aviation before, but probably not on the same scale or with a platform as ours in the V-22 Osprey,” says Osprey. According to Engdahl, this would entail gathering feedback from the entire military on the number of simulator hours required to restore a crew to competency, the kind of flying involved, and the maintenance each Osprey needs before taking to the skies once more. Pilots must maintain currency on an aircraft, which means they must fly frequently enough to be skilled in all aspects of flying, including night operations, close formation flying, and refueling, in order to ensure flight safety. That will be one of the main things the services need to have ready for when the Ospreys start flying again after a 60-day grounding. They also need to confirm that the planes are prepared. The Marines have been doing ground maneuvers to maintain the aircraft in operation while the Air Force and Marine Corps have been operating the Osprey’s engines. According to a second defense official who also spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details that have not been made public, Marine Corps leadership is also drafting a message to be sent throughout the service that could give each unit up to 30 days to recertify their crews and make sure they are prepared to return to flight. According to Marine Corps spokeswoman Capt. Alyssa Myers, the Air Force and Navy are working closely with the service “to make an informed decision for the return of the MV-22 to flight.” As we decide when to resume flying, the security and welfare of our crew members as well as the dependability of the V-22 remain top priorities in our deliberations. The Osprey is a swift airframe that can fly like an airplane by tilting its rotor blades and engines to a horizontal position after taking off like a helicopter. Although it has affected the flying operations of three services, the present Osprey standdown is one of the largest military aircraft groundings, but it is not the longest. Due to two Osprey crashes in 2000 that claimed the lives of 23 Marines while the aircraft was still in development, the Marine Corps decided to halt the program for over eighteen months. In the wake of several fatal aviation accidents in 2018, Congress created the Joint Safety Council to take a closer look at safety issues across the board for all services.