Security News > 2021 > November > Leaked footage shows British F-35B falling off HMS Queen Elizabeth and pilot's death-defying ejection
Video footage has emerged of a British F-35B fighter jet falling off the front of aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth after a botched takeoff.
The leaked clip, seemingly from a CCTV camera on the carrier's bridge, shows the Lockheed Martin-made stealth aircraft slowly trundling down the deck before tipping over the ski-jump ramp on her bows.
As the £100m RAF jet nosed over, the pilot ejected - only for his parachute to snag on the carrier's bows as he descended back towards the ship.
The F-35 crash took place a couple of weeks ago as the carrier taskforce sailed through the eastern Mediterranean, heading back towards Britain after touring the Pacific and the South China Sea - making her the first British capital ship to enter the disputed ocean since HMS Albion in 2018.
The carrier was hosting 10 US Marine Corps F-35Bs as well as eight British jets from 617 Squadron RAF, though the crashed aircraft was British.
Flying operations continued despite the accident, though the BBC reported that a high priority operation was under way to recover the crashed jet before a hostile nation such as Russia could fish it out of the deep.