Report: 'Pilot Error' Caused Fatal Blue Angels Crash in Smyrna

SMYRNA, TN — The Navy says Marine Corps Capt. Jeff Kuss was flying too fast and too low in the moments before his F/A18-C jet tumbled out of the sky and crashed, killing him during a practice flight for the Blue Angels demonstration at the Smyrna air show in June.

Naval investigators said "pilot error" was the primary cause for the crash, which occurred when the 32-year-old Kuss tried to take his plane out of a climb and into another maneuver. The report from the chief of the Navy's Air Training Command said Kuss attempted to eject.

Though pilot error was the primary reason for the accident, weather and fatigue were also cited as contributing factors.

Kuss, a native of Durango, Colo., joined the Blue Angels in 2014. He had done tours in Afghanistan before joining the Blue Angels.

From the report's executive summary:

"The cause of the mishap was pilot error. Capt. Kuss did not properly transition from the initial High Performance Climb to the first maneuver, the Split S. In order to conduct the maneuver within existing Blue Angels standard operating procedures, the aircraft should have had an optimum airspeed between 125 and 135 knows and reached a minimum altitude of 3,500 feet Above Ground Level prior to commencing the inverted maneuver at the top of the high performance climb. Capt. Kuss had a maximum airspeed of 184 knots with a maximum altitude of 3,196 feet Above Ground Level. In layman's terms, he transitioned from the high performance climb to the Split S too low too fast,and by not deselecting his afterburners during the maneuver, he continued to accelerate. The net effect of these deviations was that the aircraft simply too low and too fast to avoid impacting the ground. Although he may have been able to recover the aircraft after the initial deviations, Capt. Kuss did not attempt any type of dive recovery procedure and he unsuccessfully ejected from the aircraft too late."

Image via U.S. Navy