F-35B Lightning II fighter jet crashes near Marine Corps Air Station Miramar

An F-35B Lightning II fighter jet crashed Friday at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar near San Diego, setting off a major emergency response. The pilot safely ejected  [aka "punched out"] from the aircraft and was later rescued.

The crash happened on July 31 and involved an F-35B Lightning II, according to 1st Lt. Blake Starbuck, a spokesperson for the air station.

Starbuck said the pilot was "en route to a medical facility" after ejecting from the jet. The base later announced that the pilot was in stable condition and was being evaluated and treated for non-life-threatening injuries.

Starbuck described the incident as a "mishap" and said additional details would be released as they become available.

Video from local television stations showed thick smoke rising from the crash site as firefighters and emergency crews rushed to respond.

The accident is the latest in a series of F-35 crashes. In March, a U.S. Air Force F-35A crashed in Nevada. The pilot ejected safely and suffered only minor injuries. In July 2025, another pilot escaped safely after an F-35 crashed near Naval Air Station Lemoore in central California.

The F-35 is widely considered the most advanced fighter aircraft in the world. The Pentagon operates three versions of the jet: the F-35A for the Air Force, the F-35B for the Marine Corps, and the F-35C for the Navy. The F-35B is unique because it can take off and land vertically, much like a helicopter.

Built by Lockheed Martin, the F-35 is also the most expensive weapons program in U.S. military history. According to a 2023 Government Accountability Office report, the Pentagon is expected to spend about $1.7 trillion on nearly 2,500 F-35 aircraft over the life of the program. The project has faced years of maintenance problems, delays, and rising costs.

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Concerns over the program's price tag have been raised for years, including by President Donald Trump. Before taking office for his first term, Trump called the F-35 program "out of control" and promised to reduce its costs. Despite those concerns, the program's overall price has continued to increase.

Lockheed Martin's press office did not immediately respond Friday to a request for comment.

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White Lib Melts Down, Spews Idiotic Racist Gibberish at Winsome Earle-Sears—And Boy, Does He Look Dumb

Folks, if there's one thing I've learned in this clown show called politics, it's that where you find a heap of racism, you're knee-deep in stupidity too. And brother, that combo exploded like a bad firework at a Virginia college football game on Saturday, all thanks to some unhinged leftist white dude targeting Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, the Republican powerhouse running for governor.

Imagine this: Earle-Sears is just trying to enjoy a game at James Madison University when this genius fan, let's call him Captain Barfbreath, starts hollering racist garbage her way. "Go back to Haiti!" he screams. "Traitor!" Oh, the drama. 

Except... plot twist! Earle-Sears isn't from Haiti. She's Jamaican, you absolute muppet. Strike one for the dimwit, and strike two, he picked the worst possible moment to audition for America's Got Tantrums: right in front of a camera. Now the whole internet's roasting him like a Thanksgiving turkey.

Turns out, our hero's name is Scott Pogorelc, a staffer at Zeta Associates—which, fun fact, is tucked under the Lockheed Martin umbrella. Oh, and he's a big-shot Democratic donor to boot. Small world, right? The kind of guy who probably virtue-signals harder than a solar-powered Prius.

Let's call him Scott

But Earle-Sears is a class act, as always. She fired back on X without missing a beat: "I’ve been called names no one should ever hear, and I've watched people hold racist signs meant to shame me. And because I have an R next to my name, few care,” she wrote. “But I am no victim. Words won't break me, and they won’t stop this campaign. We are going to win."

Boom! 

Not only did Pogorelc botch Earle-Sears' entire background like a kid flunking geography, he served it up on a silver platter for the world to meme into oblivion. Lockheed's HR folks must be speed-dialing his desk as we speak, how long till he's updating that resume?

And get this: It wouldn't shock me one bit if this knucklehead had a Black Lives Matter flag flapping in his yard back in 2020, right next to his "Hate Has No Home Here" yard sign. Bet he logs hours on social media screeching about how Trump and his voters are the real racists. Yet here he is, straight out of the 1950s playbook, pulling the "go back to where you came from" card on a Black woman, why? Because she dares to think for herself and slap that R on her ballot. The hypocrisy is thicker than Kamala Harris's skull.

See, your garden-variety progressive is usually slicker than this, they cloak their ugly biases in "allyship" jargon and DEI buzzwords. But nobody handed Pogorelc the mask. He just went full villain monologue, unscripted and unhinged. What a way to go down in flames. 

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Boeing contracted to produce NGAD fighter jet F-47

“To be prepared for war is one of the most effective means of preserving peace.” — George Washington

The Pentagon has given Boeing the contract to build the Air Force’s new fighter jet, labeled the Next Generation Air Dominance, or NGAD, President Donald Trump announced on Friday. This long-awaited deal means Boeing will create a super advanced sixth-generation plane to replace the older F-22 Raptor. Trump said it will be called the F-47.

This new jet will have “state-of-the-art stealth technologies [making it] virtually unseeable,” and it’ll fly with robot drones, called collaborative combat aircraft, as its wingmen. “It’s something the likes of which nobody has ever seen before,” Trump said during an announcement in the Oval Office with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin, and Lt. Gen. Dale White. 

“In terms of all the attributes of a fighter jet, there’s never been anything even close to it, from speed to maneuverability to what it can have [as] payload. And this has been in the works for a long period of time.”

“America’s enemies will never see it coming,” he added.

Gen. Allvin said the F-47 will be “the most advanced, lethal and adaptable fighter ever developed. We are not just building another fighter. We are shaping the future of warfare and putting our enemies on notice.”

Boeing beat out Lockheed Martin for the NGAD contract after Northrop Grumman said in 2023 it wouldn’t try to lead the project. “We recognize the importance of designing, building a sixth-generation fighter capability for the United States Air Force,” said Steve Parker, a top Boeing official. He added that Boeing made a huge investment to get ready for this job and will build the best NGAD plane possible.
Lockheed Martin was bummed about losing but said it gave a solid pitch. “We will await further discussions with the U.S. Air Force on any next steps,” the company said.

Fortunately, Boeing's F-47 will have a canopy and no doors that can fall off in flight.

The F-47 will be the main part of NGAD’s “family of systems,” which includes robot drones plus high-tech sensors, weapons, and gear to connect with satellites and other aircraft. The Air Force says NGAD is key to beating tough enemies like China.

Other companies, General Atomics and Anduril, are working on their own drone wingmen, called RFQ-42A and RFQ-44A, to fly with the F-35 or F-47. The Air Force wants these drones to be affordable, run by smart software, and able to do things like spy missions, attacks, or confuse the enemy. They’ll also have special engines that adjust for the best power and fuel use, made by either General Electric Aerospace or Pratt & Whitney.

Experts say Boeing winning this deal is good for America’s defense industry. It keeps all three big U.S. plane makers—Boeing, Lockheed (which makes the F-35), and Northrop (which builds the B-21 Raider)—busy with cutting-edge projects. “For the country, that’s a really important thing, to have that innovation, that competition and frankly, the volume production,” said Doug Birkey from the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies.

But Boeing’s had some tough years. 

Its 737 Max planes crashed, killing nearly 350 people, and last year it made a deal to avoid a big trial. Another 737 Max had a door blow out mid-flight in 2024, and workers went on strike over pay issues. Plus, some military projects like the T-7A trainer and KC-46 tanker have had delays and cost overruns. In 2024, Boeing fired its defense boss, Ted Colbert, after losing tons of money.

Birkey said this win is big for Boeing, but “It’s up to Boeing to make this opportunity a win. Only time will tell on that.”

The contract Boeing got on Friday pays them to build and test the F-47, with extra rewards if they do well. They’ll make a few test planes and could build more later if the Air Force likes the results. Gen. Allvin said test versions of NGAD have already flown hundreds of hours over the past five years, proving the tech works.

“The F-47 has unprecedented maturity,” Allvin said. “While the F-22 is currently the finest air superiority fighter in the world, and its modernization will make it even better, the F-47 is a generational leap forward.” He also said that it’s better than China’s supposed sixth-generation jet, the J-36, saying, “Despite what our adversaries claim, the F-47 is truly the world’s first crewed sixth-generation fighter.”

The F-47 will cost less than the F-22, which was $143 million a pop, and the Air Force plans to buy more of them. Trump wouldn’t say the exact price, but the Air Force expects to spend $20 billion on NGAD by 2029. 

Last year, the program nearly got canceled when costs soared too high, but after a review, they decided to keep it going.

Trump hinted that allies might get a simpler version of the F-47 someday, saying, “Because someday, maybe they’re not our allies, right?”

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