Massachusetts Democrats call on Pentagon to ground Ospreys

Democratic lawmakers from Massachusetts sent a letter to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin this week requesting he ground the controversial Osprey aircraft, sharing concerns after a recent investigation found serious incidents involving the hybrid aircraft have spiked in recent years.

The Monday letter from Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D) and Ed Markey (D), along with Rep. Richard Neal (D), pointed to the "spike in grave safety issues over the past few years that include the need to address mechanical issues at the center of many of the aircraft’s past crashes."

"Given the current concerns about the safety of the V-22, the aircraft should be grounded, and should not be deployed again until the platform’s significant deficiencies are fully addressed," the lawmakers wrote, demanding answers to several questions about the safety of the Osprey.

The Osprey is one of the U.S. military's most controversial aircraft. The V-22 is valued because it takes off and lands like a helicopter but flies like a plane, making it a hybrid aircraft that can maneuver into challenging areas.

But since its debut in 1989, the Osprey has crashed repeatedly; 64 service members have been killed in incidents involving the aircraft since the first fatal crash in 1992.

The latest deadly crash off the coast of Japan in November 2023 left eight airmen dead, including a service member from Massachusetts. Afterward, the Pentagon quickly grounded the aircraft.

That grounding was lifted in March, and Air Force Special Operations Command is now slowly clearing Ospreys for full operation status. The entire fleet of some 50 aircraft is expected to resume normal operations by the spring. The Marines and Navy are also resuming Osprey flights for their separate fleets.

In a statement to The Hill, Warren said "a spike in incidents over the last five years shows that the V-22 is putting our servicemembers at high risk of danger."

"To protect our servicemembers, DoD needs to ground this aircraft and be transparent about the problems plaguing this aircraft and its plan to address the root causes of the Osprey’s significant safety issues," she said.

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have raised concern about the Osprey. After the Japan crash last year, the GOP-led House Oversight and Accountability Committee opened an investigation into the aircraft.

Families of some of the victims of the Osprey crashes also filed a lawsuit earlier this year against the manufacturers of the aircraft, Bell Textron and Boeing.

In the letter, the Massachusetts lawmakers pointed to an Associated Press investigation published last week that found the most serious types of incidents involving the Osprey rose 46 percent between 2019 and 2023.

They also raised concern about the military's conclusion into the November 2023 Japan crash, which faulted a proprotor gearbox failure but also laid the blame on pilot error.

Lawmakers said the "reality for pilots is that they have to push the aircraft to its limits to stay safe," because they have to often use an interim power mode to fly the aircraft even though they have been cautioned against that.

And there are concerns about "program failures that led to critical safety lapses," they wrote, including parts wearing out fast and alloys from Pennsylvania-based company Universal Stainless that may have led to failures for components such as the gearbox.

The lawmakers also took issue with nondisclosure agreements for Osprey maintenance workers and said they want an internal Safety Investigation Board (SIB) about V-22s and the Japan crash, and other related confidential investigations, considered for public release.

"While we understand it is the Air Force’s practice to keep SIB reports confidential," they wrote, "the past failures of this program, its continuous cause for concern, and the lives lost – as well as the fact that members of the press have already obtained the report – merit the public release of this report to restore service members’ trust in this program."