The Navy this morning — weather permitting — hopes to begin removing a downed P-8A Poseidon plane from Kaneohe Bay using “roller bags” to lift it out of the water and then mechanically roll it backward onto the lone runway at Marine Corps Base Hawaii.
The plane and its crew of nine slid off the runway while trying to land from the makai side of the base in rainy weather on Nov. 20 and ended up 100 feet offshore in plain view on the mauka end of the runway, with two points sitting on coral reef in water less than 30 feet deep.
“Hawaii has a front row seat to the (salvage) operation,” Rear Adm. Kevin P. Lenox, on-scene commander and commander of Carrier Strike Group 3, said Friday at a base news conference.
Elected officials and environmentalists have been asking the Navy and Marines to extract the plane as quickly as possible to reduce the risk of environmental damage ever since it ended up in the bay, a site of cultural, environmental and marine life significance.
Between Thursday and Friday, high tides from this week’s storm lifted the 60-ton aircraft and turned it ab0ut 30 degrees while the front landing gear remained in a pocket of coral, similar to how a human arm rotates in its shoulder socket, Lenox said, while rotating his left arm.
With rainy weather Friday, Lenox said “there’s some potential” the plane could move again overnight.
On Thursday, representatives from the state Department of Land and Natural Resources who remain on-scene saw what appeared to be a sick sea turtle in the area where the plane came to rest in the water.
It may have been the same sea turtle that was found dead Friday, Lenox said.
A necropsy may be conducted, and Lenox said he had no information on how it may have died.
The Navy has planned for the P-8A salvage operation to take no more than 16 hours and during daylight hours because “this is fatiguing work,” Lenox said.
After it’s removed, DLNR will have as much as 24 hours to survey the reef where the plane ended up and later pivoted, said Col. Jeremy Beaven, commander of Marine Corps Base Hawaii.
“We have nothing to hide,” Lenox said.
The Navy had considered raising the P-8A high enough so a crane could haul it ashore, but settled on the current plan Friday morning because “roller bags are a safe way to do it,” Lenox said.
The concept has precedent.
Louisiana-based Center Lift, which has been hired to bring the P-8A ashore, used similar procedures to retrieve a much heavier, 1,000-ton barge that ended up in “sensitive sea grass” after Hurricane Florence hit the Carolinas in 2018.
In Kaneohe Bay, Lenox said, “we’re really optimistic we’ll have a good result.”
But the timetable for beginning the salvation operation — and its success — will rely on unknown variables.
“The weather gets a vote and the equipment gets a vote,” Lenox said.
Center Lift will place its inflatable roller bags underneath the P-8A to lift it off the reef while “big machines” position the landing gear into reticulated crevices so the plane remains horizontal during the entire operation.
Cranes will then turn the plane and roll it on the air bags backward onto the runway.
The rolling bags use only three to five pounds per square inch of air to lift the plane off the reef, or less pressure than exerted by a person standing on a reef, Lenox said.
Once on land, the plane’s landing gear will be inspected for structural integrity, and then it will be towed to an area where seawater will be rinsed off to slow any corrosion from its time underwater.
But Lenox emphasized that the Navy plane is designed and built for use in maritime, saltwater conditions and that the P-8A appeared poised to return to “operational status.”
“The aircraft’s in good shape,” he said. “It’s in really good condition.”
Navy divers already retrieved the more than 2,000 gallons of fuel from the P-8A that was so pristine it can be reused, Lenox previously said.
On Friday he added that systems used for engine oil and hydraulic fluid remained “sealed … so nothing has gone into the water.”
The base runway already was surrounded by a boom to prevent contaminants from entering the bay before the P-8A crew based on Whidbey Island, Wash., attempted to land from the makai side of the runway around 2 p.m. Nov. 20 for its homeland defense mission.
A replacement crew and plane last week landed at Joint Base Pearl Harbor- Hickam to take over the original P-8A mission.
P-8A Poseidons can be armed with torpedoes and cruise missiles, but the one that skidded off the runway was unarmed when the 42-foot-tall plane landed in water so shallow that its doors were completely above water.
Crews encircled the downed P-8A with a second boom within 30 minutes, and a third was later added, along with “hydrophobic absorbent material” designed to capture any potential toxic leaks.
None of the three pilots and six crew members were injured, while the Navy begins to investigate what happened.
The mishap has caused fixed-wing operations at the base to cease out of concern takeoffs and landings could push the P-8A around further, although Marine Osprey tiltrotor aircraft continue to fly.
The Navy uses the P-8A Poseidons assigned to the “Skinny Dragons” Patrol Squadron 4 for multiple missions including submarine warfare, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.
The Boeing-built Poseidon is based on a 737 airframe and has a wingspan of nearly 124 feet and a length of nearly 130 feet, according to the Navy.
It has a maximum takeoff weight of 189,200 pounds.
