China's first woman fighter jet pilot killed
posted on Nov 14, 2016 @ 5:01PM
One of China's first female fighter pilots and a member of the country's air force aerobatics team was killed in a training accident over the weekend, according to reports. Yu Xu, 30, who was born in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan, was a member of the August 1 aerobatics team of the People's Liberation Army Air Force. She ejected from her aircraft during a training exercise in the northern province of Hebei at the weekend, reports said. She hit the wing of another jet and was killed, it said, although her male co-pilot ejected safely and survived. She was one of few female pilots who could fly domestically-made fighter jets reports said. Yu, 30, joined the People's Liberation Army Air Force in September 2005. She qualified as a fighter pilot in 2009 and qualified to fly the J-10 in 2012, when she soloed in the fighter. "As one of only four female pilots in the country capable of flying domestically made fighter jets, her death comes as a tremendous loss to the Chinese air force,"quoted a newspaper.