LONDON — Search teams have spotted wreckage and a body in the Scottish Highlands where two U.S. F-15 jets were reported missing, the Royal Air Force said Tuesday.
The wreckage, identified as an F-15, was found amid blinding snow near the summit of the 4,296-foot Ben Macdhui, the tallest peak in the Cairngorm mountains.
"Rescuers searching for two missing American aircraft in the Cairngorms have discovered a body, believed to be one of the missing pilots," the Royal Air Force said.
"The body was found in the vicinity of an aircraft wreck on the eastern side of Ben Macdhui which has been confirmed as the remains of an F-15," the statement said. It said the body was not yet identified
The search was being conducted by up to 250 RAF members, police and civilian personnel, including three RAF mountain rescue teams. The RAF said earlier the search was being hampered by "whiteout" snows and 46 mph winds.
The aircraft — each with one pilot on board — disappeared 45 minutes after taking off for a training mission Monday from Lakenheath air base, 75 miles northeast of London.
The F-15s' disappearance and a crash Monday of a U.S. Army reconnaissance plane in Germany that killed two pilots are the latest in a string of tragic military mishaps in recent weeks.
In Germany, a team of experts from the U.S. Army Safety Center at Fort Rucker, Ala., launched an investigation Tuesday into the crash of the RC-12, a twin-engine propeller aircraft used to detect, identify and locate enemy radar and electronic communications.
The plane crashed in a forest about eight miles from Nuremberg, killing the two pilots on board, as it was returning to base in Wiesbaden, Army spokeswoman Hilde Patton said from 5th Corps headquarters at Heidelberg.
German and American authorities at the scene were attempting to recover the pilots' remains, Patton said.
There was no initial indication of what caused the crash, she said. The pilots — assigned to the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade — were identified as George A. Graves, 44, and Lance Hill, 43, both chief warrant officers. Hill was a native of Paradise, Calif., while Graves' hometown was not released.
It is unusual for more than one U.S. military plane to crash on the same day, but fatal training accidents are by no means rare. On March 3 an Army C-23 Sherpa crashed in Georgia, killing all 21 people on board. On March 12, five American servicemen and one New Zealand army officer were killed when a U.S. Navy F/A-18 mistakenly hit them with bombs during training in Kuwait.
On Feb. 12, two Army Black Hawk helicopters collided during a nighttime training session in Hawaii on Feb. 12, killing six soldiers.
Statistics show that, overall, U.S. military aviation has become safer in recent years. For the fiscal year ended last Sept. 30, the military aviation accident rate was 1.23 per 100,000 flight hours — the lowest ever recorded. Fifty-eight service members were killed in aviation accidents that year, including one of the worst in years — a Marine Corps V-22 Osprey crash last April that killed all 19 Marines aboard.