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The Air Force said Monday it found a piece of the fuselage of a brand-new F-15K fighter jet that crashed during a night training flight on the seafloor 48 km northeast of Pohang last month. The wreckage was found 250 m east of where the accident is thought to have occurred, at a depth of 370 m. The Air Force has already recovered some 20 pieces of the aircraft including the fuel valve and landing gear, the tail and pieces of the engine.
The key piece of equipment is the black box, which could provide a decisive answer why the jet crashed. In an F-15K, the black box is located in the fuselage beneath the left engine, and chances are that it will be found in the vicinity. ¡°As the black box is built to withstand depths of 20,000 ft (6 km) for up to one month, it should be able to handle more than the shock it received from the crash,¡± an Air Force official said Monday.
The Air Force has been searching for the wrecked fighter with a 2,500 t probe ship, the Haeyang 2000, since last month and located the body using sonar. But the additional search and recovery work will not be easy. The area where the wreck is located is extremely muddy, and visibility is only around 30-50 cm.
The Air Force has dispatched the 12,000 t recovery vessel Badaro to the area and it started hauling up the fuselage as the search for the black box continues. The Badaro is equipped with six cameras and two manipulator robotic arms that can search the seafloor and recover submerged objects.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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