Fresno Air National Guard pilot safely lands F-15 after canopy blows off

A Fresno Air National Guard pilot kept a damaged F-15 flying after the canopy blew off at about 21,000 feet, then brought the jet back to Fresno Yosemite International Airport for a safe landing. The canopy, which weighs about 500 pounds, separated while the single-seat fighter was over military training airspace above the Sierra Nevada mountains.

Instead of ejecting, the pilot declared an emergency and flew the aircraft home. The jet landed and stopped on the runway before emergency personnel moved in, and EMS evaluated the pilot. The pilot’s condition was not immediately known. No report had surfaced on where the canopy ended up.

The emergency unfolded during a busy local weekend for the 144th Fighter Wing, whose aircraft flew over the 112th Clovis Rodeo opening ceremonies just after the national anthem. The rodeo ran April 22 to 26, and its events raise money for more than 21 local charities each year, tying the military unit to one of Fresno County’s most visible civic gatherings.

The 144th Fighter Wing is based at Fresno Air National Guard Base, and its 144th Operations Group supports the Air Sovereignty Alert mission and daily F-15 training. That steady training tempo helps explain why the wing’s aircraft are such a familiar sight over Fresno County, even though a malfunction like this remains rare.

The unit’s roots go back to April 4, 1948. The 194th Fighter Squadron moved to Fresno in 1954, the wing followed in 1957, and the Department of the Air Force selected the 144th Fighter Wing in 2023 as a preferred location for F-15EX Eagle II aircraft to replace its aging F-15C/D fleet.

The close call also highlighted the safety systems built around Fresno’s fighter operations. In a previous F-15 emergency at Fresno Yosemite International Airport, a pilot landed safely using the runway arresting cable system. This time, the pilot got the aircraft down without ejecting, turning a potentially catastrophic failure into a controlled return to the runway with no reported harm on the ground.