The loss of life that occurred from the Sunday crash of the MV-22 Osprey aircraft is already a tragedy for the U.S. Marines and its families. However, failure to take this as a warning also could prove calamitous for the larger community that nestles close to Oahu’s military bases.
The Osprey, long controversial for safety problems that surfaced early in its development, went down at Marine Corps Training Area Bellows, carrying 21 Marines and a Navy corpsman on board. Two Marines were killed and two more remain hospitalized for their injuries.
What has people in the adjacent town of Waimanalo justly concerned is the realization of the risk they carry simply by being neighbors of Bellows, also home to an Air Force station; the entire installation encompasses both a training area and a recreation attraction. That latter section primarily comprises a cabin retreat for military and their families and guests, but the stretch of beach that’s closest to the front gate is open to civilians on weekends, as well.
And the weekend, of course, is when this accident happened. These circumstances underscore the need for the military investigation of the crash to be thorough and transparent to the public.
The commander of U.S. Marine Corps Forces, Pacific, is to appoint an investigating officer; so far the command only has issued a call for witnesses to email marforpacpao@usmc.mil.
Beyond the inquiry, it’s also time for serious conversation to begin, engaging the community with the representatives of the shared military installation, on what more should be done to ensure public safety. At the very least, the overflights of this particular aircraft so close to residential areas deserve an examination.
The Osprey is a tiltrotor military craft designed to accomplish vertical takeoff and landing, like a conventional helicopter, as well as the long-range flight performance of a turboprop plane. Clearly, the capability of pinpoint landing combined with the capacity to carry troops make the craft an asset.
The U.S. Navy and Marine Corps took the lead on its development, with initial design work done more than 30 years ago. The first prototypes came out in 1989 — and there were crashes of the fourth and fifth prototypes. Full-scale flight testing began a decade later, with further crashes killing a total of 19 in 2000.
The cost overruns of the Ospreys’ development were astronomical, which fueled the critique, and the program was nearly scrapped. But it’s always been the safety concerns that primarily spurred calls to abandon its manufacture.
The governor of Okinawa has called for all Osprey flights to be suspended in his area until the cause of Sunday’s crash here is determined. The American military operates 24 Ospreys there and has just announced that 10 more would be deployed to Yokota Air Base near Tokyo, starting next year. While the Okinawan furor is fueled in part by political opposition to the larger military presence there, the public outcry is not something to be ignored, here or anywhere.
There have since been changes to the systems and procedures, and the Marines emphasize that the more current safety record is vastly improved. One statistic cited by officials: For every 100,000 flight hours, the Osprey has had 3.2 mishaps involving loss of life or damage exceeding $2 million. By comparison, the CH-46 Sea Knight helicopters, which the Ospreys are replacing, have a rate of 2.98 per 100,000 flight hours.
That may not seem like a significant difference, but given the checkered history of this craft, the neighboring civilian community has a right to be concerned — and interested in the accident inquiry.
"Please be patient with the process," Marine officials said in a prepared statement, "and understand it may take several weeks if not months before we receive the final investigation results."
People can be patient, of course, but they should not be expected to simply sit passively and wait. They need and deserve a chance to air their worries about community safety and be heard by the forces sending the aircraft overhead.
