4 U.S. Marines die in NATO exercise as Osprey crashes into Norway
HELSINKI – Four U.S. Marine soldiers were killed when their Osprey plane crashed into a Norwegian city in the Arctic Circle during a NATO exercise unrelated to Russia’s war in Ukraine, authorities said on Saturday.
Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere tweeted that they died in the accident on Friday night. The cause is being investigated, but Norwegian police reported bad weather in the area.
The Marine Corps, assigned to the 2nd Marine wing of the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force, participated in the NATO Cold Response Exercise.
The United States says the Marines are not immediately identified, which is in line with the U.S. Department of Defense’s practice of notifying relatives.
The plane was an MV-22B Osprey. It “had a crew of four and was on a training mission in Nordland County” in northern Norway, the country’s armed forces said in a statement.
It was on its way north to Bodo, where it was due to land just before 6pm on Friday. Osprey plunged to the ground in Graetaedalen, Beiarn, south of Bodo. According to police, the search and rescue operation was launched immediately. Police arrived at the scene on Saturday at 1:30 a.m. and confirmed the four-person crew had died.
The Cold Response exercise includes about 30,000 troops, 220 aircraft and 50 ships from 27 countries. Finland and Sweden, which are not members of NATO, are also included. The rehearsals began on March 14 and end on April 1.
The cause of the accident was not told, but the Norwegian Armed Forces said that the Cold Response “thinks as planned, with the necessary measures due to the weather”.
A Norwegian rescue helicopter spotted the crash site late Friday, and local Red Cross crews were ordered to help police in the country, Norwegian media reported.
Norwegian newspaper VG said members of the Red Cross drove near the scene of the accident on scooters and marked the path with GPS to police, which they described as extremely difficult weather conditions at the beginning of Saturday.
“It was a special night, it was a real storm. There were five of us driving towards the scene of the accident. Visibility was a meter, snow and a storm in the mountains,” Oerjan Kristensen, leader of the Red Cross team, told VG. “It was probably a gust of wind at 30 to 40 meters per second. When it blows, it’s hard to stand upright.”
Kristensen added that the rescue operation is hampered by the danger of landslides in the mountains and the remoteness of the scene of the accident.
Police launched an investigation into the accident and members of the accident board and police were scheduled to arrive at the scene of the accident on Saturday.
“The weather in the area is very bad to do the work on site, but the police will take up the matter again as soon as the weather conditions allow,” Executive Director Ivar Bo Nilsson of the Norland Police District told reporters.
Lieutenant General Yngve Odlo, Chief of the Norwegian Armed Forces Operational Staff, said Cold Response continues despite the accident.
“Currently, the focus is entirely on ending the rescue operation, taking care of the people and then there is a normal causal procedure,” Odlo told Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation NRK.
The first Cold Response Exercise was held in 2006 and is held every two years. They take place in south-eastern, central and northern Norway.