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A U.S. Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon fighter jet mistakenly dropped a bomb on private property miles from a bombing range in Japan. The Air Force released the accident report earlier this week, though the incident took place on November 6, 2019. The report explains that pilot error caused the GBU-12 laser guided bomb to strike the wrong target miles away from the actual target.

An F-16CM fighter from the 14th Fighter Squadron was flying a training mission at the Draughon Bombing Range, located approximately 15 miles away from the fighter’s home base at Misawa Air Base. The pilot accidentally sent the GBU-12 flying to a target location he believed another F-16 was spotting for him. Instead, the bomb was sent to another location, 3.4 miles away and off the bombing range—on private property. No one was killed or injured during the incident, and there was no damage to property.

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According to the Air Force, the aircraft and pilot were both immediately grounded after the incident. The pilot was disqualified, retrained in weapons handling, and was ordered to brief all the other pilots at Misawa “on the sequence of events leading up to the mishap to prevent a similar incident.”

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