A U.S. Navy diver jumps from the USNS Salvor during the ongoing CV-22 Osprey recovery efforts off the coast of Yakushima, Japan, on Dec. 27, 2023. (Chelsea Meiller/U.S. Navy)
U.S. and Japanese crews continue to search for the remains of the last crew member killed when an Air Force CV-22B Osprey crashed off the coast of southwestern Japan last month, the Air Force said recently.
Divers searched the waters around Yakushima, an island just south of Kyushu, the southernmost of Japan’s four main islands, for the remains of Maj. Eric Spendlove, 36, of St. George, Utah, Air Force Special Operations Command said in a Facebook post Wednesday.
“Locating and recovering our eighth Airman remains the primary effort,” the command wrote.
Salvage teams meanwhile are working to recover the tiltrotor aircraft, according to several Air Force Special Operations Command news releases.
A Navy rescue and salvage ship, the USNS Salvor, joined the search Dec. 23, and its crew is coordinating with teams from the Japan Coast Guard, Japan Self-Defense Force, local law enforcement, volunteers and other U.S. military assets, the command announced in a news release that day.
The salvage ship USNS Salvor on Dec. 23, 2023, joined the search and recovery efforts for the Air Force CV-22B Osprey tiltrotor that crashed off the coast of southwestern Japan on Nov. 29. (Chelsea Meiller/U.S. Navy)
U.S. Navy sailors make pre-dive checks onboard the salvage ship USNS Salvor during the ongoing CV-22B Osprey recovery efforts off Yakushima, Japan, Dec. 27, 2023. (Chelsea Meiller/U.S. Navy)
More than 1,000 military and law enforcement personnel and over 100 civilians had joined the search as of Dec. 12. The teams by Dec. 8 had searched the entirety of Yakushima’s 55-mile coastline and more than 31,000 square miles of the surrounding ocean surface, Air Force Special Operations Command said Dec. 12.
At least 46 U.S. and Japanese aircraft, 11 aerial drones and 23 ships have participated in the search, while 10 underwater unmanned vessels and more than 50 divers have searched the ocean floor, the command said.
The Osprey, which operated under the callsign Gundam 22, crashed off the coast of Yakushima on Nov. 29 during a routine training mission.
The aircraft was assigned to the 353rd Special Operations Wing at Yokota Air Base in western Tokyo and had departed Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni near Hiroshima that day. It was en route to Kadena Air Base on Okinawa.
The cause of the crash is still under investigation, but preliminary findings determined it was likely an equipment failure rather than human error.
The body of Staff Sgt. Jake Galliher, 24, of Pittsfield, Mass., was found within hours of the crash alongside an empty life raft and wreckage from the aircraft.
The remains of five more were discovered on Dec. 4 along with the aircraft’s fuselage about 100 feet below the ocean’s surface.
Two were identified Dec. 5 as Maj. Luke Unrath, 34, of Riverside, Calif., and Tech Sgt. Zachary Lavoy, 33, of Oviedo, Fla.
Three more were identified Dec. 6 as Capt. Terrell Brayman, 32, of Pittsford, N.Y.; Staff Sgt. Jake Turnage, 25, of Kennesaw, Ga.; and Senior Airman Brian Johnson, 32, of Reynoldsburg, Ohio.
The Secretary of the Air Force posthumously promoted Brayman to major with an effective date of Dec. 15, Air Force Special Operations Command said in a Dec. 13 news release.
The body of the seventh crewmember, Maj. Jeff Hoernemann, 32, of Andover, Minn., was discovered Dec. 10 and publicly identified on Dec. 11 after his family was notified.
Following the crash, the Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps grounded their Ospreys under a service-wide operational stand down until the investigation determines the cause of the crash and recommendations are made to return the aircraft to service.
