"Friendly fire" from a Patriot missile battery is unlikely to have caused the downing of a U.S.-made F-16 fighter jet, the New York Times reported on Aug. 31, citing two undisclosed senior U.S. military officials.
Ukraine's General Staff confirmed on Aug. 29 that the F-16, which had been recently delivered to the country and was being operated by pilot Oleksii Mes, had crashed while defending against a mass Russian drone and missile attack on Aug. 26. Mes was killed in the crash.
The cause of the accident remains unclear, but early investigation suggests that a Patriot anti-aircraft system shot out the F-16, The Telegraph reported on Aug. 31.
American and Ukrainian investigators are looking at different versions of the crash, including mechanical failure or pilot error, according to the NYT.
Following the F-16 crash, President Volodymyr Zelensky dismissed Ukraine's Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk on Aug. 30. Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said that his removal was not connected to the deadly accident.
Ukraine's Defense Ministry has also established a special commission to investigate the cause of the crash. Oleshchuk said that Ukraine had received a preliminary report from the U.S., which he said is now part of the investigation.
At the same time, Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh said on Aug. 29 that she was "not aware of any assistance or requests for assistance from the Ukrainian side to us about this particular incident."
Singh declined to discuss the crash in more detail, repeatedly saying that such questions should be referred to Ukrainian officials.
Ukraine received its first F-16s at the beginning of August, a year after its allies formed the fighter jet coalition at the NATO summit in Vilnius to support Kyiv with training and aircraft.
Chris York
(Updated: )
