Fatal Collision of Jet Fighters Linked to Birds

A midair collision between two military jets that killed two airmen last fall was blamed Thursday on an attempt by one pilot to avoid flying into birds.

The collision occurred Oct. 22 when an F-16 fighter collided with a T-38 training jet. Two crew members in the T-38--a U.S. Air Force pilot and a visiting British Royal Air Force flier--died after trying to bail out.

A statement Thursday by the headquarters of the U.S. Air Force Materiel Command at Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio said the investigation is complete and investigators concluded the pilot of the F-16 “collided with [the other plane] in an attempt to avoid hitting some birds.”

The report did not say whether any action would be taken against the F-16 pilot. At the time of the accident, officials identified the F-16 pilot as Lt. Col. Richard Stevens, deputy commander of the 412th Operations Group, with Capt. Nicole Blatt, of the 412th Test Wing, in the other seat. The F-16, with damage to one wing, landed safely on a dry lake runway.

The bodies of the pilots of the T-38 were found several miles from the wreckage of their plane, along with their ejection seats and partly deployed parachutes. The planes were traveling at about 585 mph at an altitude of only 2,700 feet when the collision occurred, according to earlier reports.

Killed were Lt. Col. William R. Nusz of Rosamond, an avid flier and popular flight instructor, and Flight Lt. Leigh Alexander Fox, an RAF pilot at Edwards on an exchange program.

Both fighters were flying a photographic support mission alongside a B-1 bomber, taking photographs as the B-1 dropped 25-pound dummy bombs designed to mimic the flight characteristics of 2,000-pound conventional bombs. The planes were preparing to return to the base when the crash occurred.