No injuries were reported after a 300-gallon external fuel tank fell off an F-16 fighter into a residential neighborhood outside Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., on Jan. 7, a base spokesperson told Air & Space Forces Magazine.
The tank fell off at around 11 a.m. and landed in Niceville, just 3.5 miles northeast of the base, the spokesperson said.
Eglin uses manned F-16s to test new weapons, uncrewed QF-16s as aerial target drones, and just recently received modified F-16s to test autonomous flying technology as part of the Viper Experimentation and Next-gen Operations Model – Autonomy Flying Testbed program.
The spokesperson could not say to which unit the mishap aircraft belonged but did say it was manned and the base later confirmed it is assigned to the 96th Test Wing. An investigation is underway.
“Eglin authorities are cleaning up the area and taking measures needed to ensure the fuel tank is safely removed,” the base public affairs office said in a press release. The base will fly a small drone over the area to survey the impact zone.
Photos posted online by local media outlet Mid Bay News show what appears to be the centerline fuel tank that hangs from the middle of the F-16’s fuselage, but the base spokesperson could not immediately confirm that was the specific type of tank that fell. The Eglin public affairs office later said in the release that it was a 300-gallon fuel tank.
Based on the photos, the tank landed in between two homes, a little over a quarter mile away from an elementary school.
On Facebook, the popular unofficial Air Force amn/nco/snco page posted photos allegedly showing the F-16 after it landed at Eglin with its center fuel tank missing.
“Only by the grace of God, it landed between two houses,” Niceville City Manager David Deitch told the Mid Bay News, which also reported “a strong smell of jet fuel” in the area.
Many service members are exposed to jet fuel throughout their careers, but the long-term health impacts of such exposure is not yet clear, according to a 2023 presentation by the VA.
The incident came about four weeks after an exercise which saw first responders with the Eglin-based 96th Test Wing practice responding to a “large-scale aircraft accident” with outside agencies.
Late last year, the Air Force Chief of Safety Maj. Gen. Sean M. Choquette rolled out a new effort that requires aircraft maintainers to sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) so they can access more information about costly accidents. The move was in response to an increase in ground mishaps involving maintenance, aircraft towing, and other flight line work. The NDA is meant to give maintainers the same timely access to safety investigation findings that aircrew members already enjoy, he said.
“We said, ‘hey, [maintainers] need to be brought into the fold here, because ground operations mishaps were increasing, and they need to be better trained on where mistakes are being made,’” Choquette told reporters in October.
This story has been updated with more details from Eglin Air Force Base. It will continue to be updated as more details become available.