F-18 Declares EMERGENCY in MIDDLE of Sea | Diverts to St. Paul

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"On Monday July 25, 2016, Jessica Earp was monitoring 20 to 30 aircraft in two sectors of sky over the Bering Sea between Alaska and Asia when one voice suddenly declared an emergency. This was a Marine Corps F/A-18 Hornet fighter jet (VMFA 242 based in |wakuni, Japan), on a ferry flight from Eielson Air Force Base near Fairbanks to a training exercise in Asia. The pilot, Capt. Jesse Simmermon, turned his aircraft back toward Alaska, with another F/A-18 accompanying him. Both were running low on fuel. A tanker aircraft traveling with the jets was refueling another Hornet in the flight group and couldn't break away. Earp said the tanker tried circling back to reach the two F/A-18s. But by that time, the jets were too far away. "When (Simmermon) started asking, 'Where is the tanker, how much farther is it?' I started to hear the catch in his voice," Earp said, recalling the incident. Soon the engine failure forced the Hornet pilots to a lower altitude. Earp said the Hornets were planning to land at King Salmon - still 550 miles away. But she had a different idea. "There's an airport about 80 miles to the southeast, St. Paul," Earp radioed Simmermon:"I can get runway distance, if you need, and conditions." "Affirm," Simmermon promptly replied. "We need all that." Within seconds of Simmermon's request, Earp quickly and calmly relayed the information he'd requested, along with a vector from their current location to the island's airport. Despite dismal weather at other airports across the region, the skies over St. Paul were so clear that the Marines had no problem spotting it over 40 miles away. "It's a needle in a haystack," Earp said. "It was the only viable airport in the Bering Sea he could have landed at." "I will never forget the cool, calm and collected voice which politely suggested that we consider making a landing at St. Paul," Simmermon later wrote in an email thanking Earp. Soon after their landing, Earp said, confirmation of their safe arrival came from an FAA weather camera on the island. Less than an hour after the 2 Hornets were on the ground, Simmermon wrote that the weather had taken a turn for the worse.

Jessica Earp's handling of the situation earned her the Archie League Medal of Safety Award, named after the first air traffic controller and reserved for members of the profession whose work saves lives. She received the Alaskan Region award at NATCA's convention in Las Vegas.

(source: Anchorage Daily News Archives)

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