Navy Secretary Richard V. Spencer said Wednesday there is not enough data to link recent military air mishaps, such as the most recent deadly C-130 Hercules crash in Georgia, to a lack of defense funding.
The Puerto Rico Air National Guard transport aircraft went down near Savannah, Ga., with five people on board, and it was unclear how many of the passengers died. A Marine Corps C-130 crashed in Mississippi in July, killing 15 Marines and one sailor.
The military services have suffered numerous fatal air crashes over the past year and face growing mishap rates. Lawmakers on Capitol Hill were quick to conclude the incidents were evidence that budget caps were hurting military aviation and cited them in a push for a two-year hike in defense spending.
But Spencer said the Navy and Marine Corps could not draw a straight line between mishaps and the budget.
“There is not enough data right now to tell you that there is an exact correlation,” he said.
The larger budget in 2018 is allowing the services to conduct more flight training and maintenance on aircraft.
“Those additives hours those people have in the cockpit or doing their jobs are only going to help, so now we have the funds to do that,” Spencer said. “But that is kind of a brilliant flash of the obvious comment; I don’t have data to give you a direct correlation.”
There were still scant details on the Georgia crash Wednesday afternoon, but the C-130 crash last summer was the most deadly Marine Corps aviation incident in more than a decade.
“I think we have a pretty good idea of what happened to our airplane last year. In that particular case, I’m not sure funding would have changed the outcome,” said Gen. Robert Neller, the Marine Corps commandant.
Neller said the cause of was “mechanical” but declined to elaborate, saying the families of the Marines and sailor who were killed had just been notified of the investigation results.
The C-130 that crashed Wednesday belonged to the Puerto Rico Air National Guard. The incident closed down area roads and videos of billowing black smoke were posted online.
