Pilots Eject From F-15QA After Runway Incident At Illinois Airport
Two active duty US pilots suffered minor injuries after ejecting from an F-15QA at MidAmerica St. Louis Airport in Mascoutah, Illinois early Tuesday morning.
A Boeing official who spoke with KMOV 4 said that the incident occured after the F-15QA had landed at around 7:30AM, making it a runway incident instead of the earlier classification of a crash. News footage from the scene shows the F-15QA on the grass with its landing gear down, after departing the runway following landing.
Scott Air Force Base, the home base of the F-15QA involved and which shares facilities with MidAmerica St. Louis, issued the following statement on the incident:
“An F-15QA, recently accepted by the Air Force from the Boeing Corporation, departed the runway today at MidAmerica Airport, Ill. Two U.S. active duty pilots who were on board ejected safely and received minor injuries. The aircraft was slated to be transferred to the Qatari Air Force through the Foreign Military Sales program. The incident is currently under investigation.”
Scott Air Force Base received its first F-15QAs in February. The base is the training center for Qatar Emiri Air Force pilots training on the new aircraft. According to sources who spoke with Military.com, the two pilots of the F-15QA at the time were from the Air Force and the Navy. Both had been assigned to the Defense Contract Management Agency, which works with contractors to ensure delivery of equipment to both US and foreign militaries.
As previously reported, the F-15QA is an advanced derivative of the F-15, featuring a fully digital cockpit with large area touchscreen displays and redesigned wings among other improvements. The Qatar Emiri Air Force has 36 aircraft on order, with the F-15QA making its first flight in April 2020. The US Air Force’s F-15EX Eagle II is a version of the F-15QA, with the first test Eagle II arriving at Eglin Air Force Base in March, following its own first flight in February.