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By Adam Staten
Staff Writer
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Five military members are dead following the crash of an aircraft in southern California.
On Thursday afternoon, the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing (MAW) confirmed the deaths of the five Marines on social media following Wednesday's crash near Glamis, California, just before 12:30 p.m. PST.
"We mourn the loss of our Marines in this tragic mishap. Our hearts go out to their families and friends as they cope with this tragedy," said Major General Bradford Gering, the commanding general of the 3rd MAW.
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Thursday's announcement of the fatalities comes after the Naval Air Facility El Centro Facebook page originally posted that both military and civilian first-responder crews were headed to the scene after confirming that an aircraft belonging to the 3rd MAW had crashed.
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Initially, some reports stated that there was nuclear material on board the aircraft but that was later found to not be the case.
The release goes on to state that the crash of the MV-22B Osprey occurred due to an "aviation mishap" during a training mission.
The names of those who perished in Wednesday's crash will be released 24 hours after their next-of-kin has been made aware, per policy.
An investigation of that crash is currently underway.
On Wednesday, military officials identified the U.S. Navy pilot who was killed in another crash earlier this month. Lieutenant Richard Bullock was killed when his F/A-18E Super Hornet crashed in the Mojave Desert.
"The Navy mourns this tragic loss alongside the family, friends and shipmates of Lt. Bullock," a statement from the Navy said.
Bullock's fatal crash also happened during a training mission. No civilians were injured in that crash, and the cause of the incident remains under investigation.
Wednesday's fatal crash also comes after four members of the U.S. military were killed in a March crash during a NATO exercise north of Norway. The aircraft involved in the fatal March crash was the same model in Wednesday's crash—an MV-22B Osprey.
Richard Martindell, a military aviation expert and crash investigator, told Fox 5 San Deigo that those particularly aircraft models do appear to experience crashes at a higher frequency than others.
"Looking at the Air Force statistics for the Osprey, they're running about a 6.0 per hundred thousand hours accident rate which is high. Most transport aircraft run around under 2.0, so that's three times the transport aircraft number," Martindell told Fox 5.
When reached for further comment and more information, the military stated to Newsweek that it had nothing further to add about Wednesday's crash at the time.
Update 6/9/22, 2:47 p.m. ET: This story had been updated to include confirmation on the number of fatalities, clarify information on the lack of nuclear material at the scene of the crash and provide more background information.
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