An Iranian Army Fighter Jet Crashed in Isfahan Province

According to reports, an F-7 fighter jet of the Iranian Army crashed on Saturday, June 1, about 20 kilometers from the city of Hassanabad Jarguyeh Olya in Isfahan Province, but both pilots ejected and survived. The Tasnim news agency reported that the pilots directed the aircraft to an uninhabited area and ejected themselves. Iranian news agencies, without providing details, stated that the cause of the crash was a technical failure. The public relations office of the Iranian Air Force also announced that the aircraft had taken off for training from Shahid Babayi Air Base in Isfahan. According to Fars news agency, the wreckage of the aircraft was found around 2 PM on Saturday. On Tuesday, May 28, a light training aircraft of the Army's Ground Force, which was flying from Isfahan to Tehran, crashed near Imam Khomeini Airport due to technical issues, killing both pilots. In recent years, several military aircraft of Iran have crashed. For instance, on Saturday, November 11, 2017, a Sukhoi-22 fighter jet belonging to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps crashed in Sarvestan County, Fars Province, killing its pilot. On Thursday, December 1, 2016, the IRGC also lost a 'light gyroplane' during a mission at Saravan Airport in Sistan and Baluchestan Province. Earlier, on Saturday, October 11, 2014, a Turbo Commander aircraft crashed in the Kourin region of Zahedan, killing seven occupants, including three senior officials of the Islamic Republic's police force. At that time, some websites reported that the aircraft had been shot down by a missile fired by armed groups opposed to the Islamic Republic, but Ismail Ahmadi Moghadam, the then commander of the police force, denied this claim and accused the news disseminators of trying to portray 'terrorists' as strong. In recent years, several commanders and personnel of Iran's military forces, including Ahmad Kazemi, commander of the IRGC Ground Forces, and Mansour Setareh Khas, the then commander of the Air Force, have lost their lives in military aircraft crashes. According to statistics from Iran's Ministry of Roads and Urban Development, from 1979 to 2014, a total of 1,985 people were killed in aviation accidents in Iran. In the latest incident, an ATR 72-200 aircraft belonging to Aseman Airlines crashed in the Dena Mountains on February 18, 2018, killing all 60 passengers and six crew members on board. The aging of Iran's air fleet has been cited as one of the reasons for aircraft crashes. Following the Vienna nuclear agreement, several Airbus, Fokker, and ATR aircraft were added to Iran's aging fleet, but with the US withdrawal from the agreement, Iran's orders to Boeing and Airbus became uncertain.