Minus $60 million! F/A-18 fighter jet crashes overboard USS Harry S. Truman in Red Sea

A US Navy F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jet has been lost at sea after it crashed overboard the aircraft carrier USS "Harry S. Truman" while being towed, the Navy said in a statement, CNN reports.

A US official says that initial reports from the scene suggest it made a sharp turn to avoid Houthi fire, which contributed to the fighter jet going overboard. Yemen's Houthi rebels said they launched a drone and missile attack on the aircraft carrier in the Red Sea on Monday as part of a major U.S. military operation against the Iran-backed group. U.S. Navy aircraft carriers - the world's largest warships at nearly 1,000 feet long and displacing nearly 100,000 tons - are surprisingly agile for their size.

Powered by two nuclear reactors that turn four propellers, Nimitz-class carriers like the Harry S. Truman can reach speeds of more than 34 mph (55 km/h). The exact details of the turn the Harry S. Truman made to avoid Houthi fire have not been made public, but photos and videos of the ship and other Nimitz-class carriers on the Department of Defense website show that the massive ships can form a significant line during a high-speed turn.

All personnel on board have been identified, and one sailor suffered minor injuries, the Navy said. “The F/A-18E aircraft was under active tow in the hangar when the moving crew lost control of the aircraft. The aircraft and the tug were lost overboard,“ the statement said. “The sailors towing the aircraft took immediate action to move away from the aircraft before it fell overboard. The investigation is ongoing.“ A second U.S. official told CNN that the aircraft had gone down.

According to the Navy, an F/A-18 fighter costs more than $60 million. The “Harry S. Truman” is based in the Middle East and was in the Red Sea at the time of the incident. The Navy stressed that the strike group and its air wing "remain fully mission-capable." In recent weeks, the Trump administration has stepped up airstrikes on Houthi targets in Yemen, prompting threats of retaliation from the rebel group against American warships.