BUTTERWORTH: A Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) officer was killed and another was injured when their aircraft crashed during a training exercise at its base at Teluk Ayer Tawar near here.
The officer who was killed in the Tuesday (Nov 16) night crash of a Hawk 108 jet fighter has been identified as Kapt Mohamad Affendi Bustamy.
His co-pilot who was injured and is now hospitalised at the Seberang Jaya Hospital
has been identified as Major Mohd Fareez Omar.
It is understood that the two servicemen were conducting night flying training when the incident occurred.
Both the pilots are married and their families have been notified.
In a post on Twitter about the crash, Defence Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein expressed condolences to the family of the officer who was killed in the incident.
He said the injured officer had been rushed to the hospital for treatment.
Hishammuddin added that he was saddened by the incident, and said that his Ministry has been ordered to carry out a probe on the incident and to assist the family of the two officers.
Prior to this, the RMAF confirmed in a statement that the crash occurred at 10.07pm on Tuesday
"The RMAF confirms there has been an accident involving a HAWK fighter jet plane belonging to RMAF at the runway of the Butterworth airbase at about 10.07pm on Nov 16," it said.
The RMAF added that it is taking immediate measures and will issue update on the incident.
