A pilot with the Vermont Air National Guard’s 158th Fighter Wing experienced an in-flight emergency Friday morning about 13 minutes into a training flight and needed to jettison his external fuel tanks, burning off most of the fuel first, reports the Burlington Free Press. The pilot dropped the tanks over a planned location in Lake Champlain and landed safely at the wing’s home at Burlington Airport. A subsequent Free Press report said the Coast Guard had found one of the tanks near Willsboro Point, N.Y., and that an environmental team from Albany, N.Y., would retrieve it. The Coast Guard was still searching for the second tank.
The U.S. supports “a stronger and more capable” European defense, Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III said during an Oct. 22 press conference in Brussels—but that defense should not duplicate the functions and capabilities of the NATO alliance.