A fishing charter boat captain who rescued two parachuting Navy pilots after witnessing their unmanned fighter jet plummet into San Diego Bay described what he saw as something from a movie.

The U.S. Navy electronic-warfare aircraft, a Boeing EA-18G Growler, crashed into San Diego Bay near Naval Air Station North Island just after 10:15 a.m. Wednesday.

Capt. Brandon Viets of Premier Sportfishing had 12 people on board his boat for recreational fishing nearby on what he called a "normal day," when everything suddenly went south.

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"Normally we hear jets taking off, because North Island is right there next to us, less than a half mile away," Viets told Fox News Digital. 

However, on Wednesday's trip, he said, a nearby jet was louder than usual, capturing his attention.

"We were cruising out, and when I looked back, I saw a jet at almost eye level, about a few hundred yards off the back of the boat," he said. "I looked to the right of that jet, and I saw two parachutes with two guys falling down."

Viets described the surreal feeling of watching the fighter jet flying, not knowing if anyone was onboard piloting it.

"At that point, I'm like, ‘Holy moly,’" he said. "Like, this is what we see in movies."

Without hesitation, Viets took to the PA system to notify the crew.

"I was telling them, 'Hey, we're going. We've got to go help,'" he said. "'We don't know if they are injured or not or if there are people in the water, and we need to get them out of there.'"

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The crew turned the boat around and sped toward the pilots.

Viets said the boat was going as fast as the engine allowed, and they were soon next to the two soaked service members.

The plane was still in the air.

"As soon as I pulled up to them, I was yelling to them, just to make sure they were OK," he said. "Then I heard this loud noise, boom, and [the jet] hit the water less than an eighth of a mile away from us."

The military aircraft crashed on the other side of the channel, Viets said.

He described a "plume" of sand, muck and water, at least 80 feet high, shooting up from the bay.

Viets' crew retrieved all the boat's safety gear, including safety ladders, and positioned the boat near the pilots in the water.

Both pilots were pulled from the water and were coherent, according to Viets.

"I didn't ask anything about what happened or the plane. I was just worried about them," he said. "I asked about how they were, and their composure was pretty good for what just happened. They were pretty calm and collected about it, but you could still see a lot of [things] going on in their brains."

Crew members instructed the pilots to sit down and later were met by the Coast Guard.

A Navy vessel then picked the pilots up and took them to a nearby dock, Viets said. The fishing boat joined and stayed with the authorities for about 45 minutes.

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The Coast Guard San Diego Office confirmed the service members were then transferred to U.S. Customs and Border Patrol Air and Marine Operations.

"Then the Coast Guard said, ‘OK, you guys are good to go,'" Viets said. "We went fishing after that and caught a few fish for a couple of hours."

Both pilots were taken to a hospital and were reportedly in stable condition, according to the Coast Guard.

Viets said the crew assisted a few small private boats in the past that sank, but Wednesday's incident was unique.

"We have assisted smaller vessels, helping someone get off their boat or if they need a pump or something small like that, but nothing involving an aircraft that crashed — or pilots with parachutes in the water," he said. "Nothing like that."

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He added it took a while for the gravity of the day's events to sink in.

"It took me a little while to take it in and just to think, 'I'm glad that plane landed somewhere where it didn't hurt anyone,'" Viets said. "I'm still thinking, ‘Luckily, it landed somewhere safe, not on land, and those two pilots seem to be OK.’"

The cause of the crash has not yet been released by Naval Base Coronado’s Emergency Operations Center, which is investigating.

However, H&M Landing, a fishing company, provided a statement to Fox News Digital claiming the aircraft experienced a "mechanical failure."

A Navy official told Fox News Digital it is unclear if a distress signal was sent out prior to the crash, and the pilots have not been publicly identified.

As of Thursday, the Navy is continuing efforts to safely remove the aircraft from the bay as quickly as possible, while minimizing environmental impact, according to a statement. Weather conditions may delay the timeline. 

In a statement Thursday, the Naval Air Forces said it is leading efforts to assess and coordinate the jet's retrieval, and Explosive Ordnance Disposal Group One is the tactical commander for salvage operations.

"Some pieces of debris may resemble weapons or classified components and may present a hazard if handled," it said in the statement.

The public is strongly advised not to approach, touch or collect any debris that may wash ashore. They are also asked to remain clear of the area and not interfere with the recovery.

The wreck came after a recent string of fatal plane crashes across the country.

An Army Black Hawk helicopter collided midair with a commercial passenger plane near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport Jan. 29, killing 67 people.

In the following days, plane crashes in Pennsylvania and Alaska claimed the lives of 17 people.

Most recently, a private jet owned by Mötley Crüe lead singer Vince Neil was involved in a fatal crash Monday at Scottsdale Airport in Arizona.

Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., launched a unique attack against U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer over a plan to relinquish a military base in the Indian Ocean, cautioning the British leader to "put down the bong."

"The United Kingdom is our friend. I went to school there for a while. I love them and I want to see the prime minister do well, but he needs to put down the bong. He needs to put down the bong," Kennedy said during remarks on the floor of the Senate. "This makes absolutely no sense, and it’s going to be a big part of his legacy if he gives away this island and our military base to, in effect, what will eventually be China."

At issue is the fate of the Chagos Islands, a British overseas territory in the Indian Ocean that currently hosts a U.S.-U.K. joint naval base at Diego Garcia.

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But a ruling by the International Court of Justice in 2019 that was backed by the United Nations found that the U.K. had no claim to the islands, spurring an October announcement that the U.K. had cut a deal to hand over sovereignty of the islands to Mauritius.

While the deal calls for the base to remain under American and British control for another 99 years, the plan to hand over the territory has received pushback in both the U.K and the United States.

Kennedy let it be known that he was one of those critics, calling the plan to give up control of the islands "bone deep down to the marrow stupid."

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"Because the United Nations wants the United Kingdom to feel guilty, they want to give our military base and their military base to Mauritius," Kennedy said. "Now, the prime minister of the United Kingdom can stop this, and Marco Rubio, our new secretary of state, is against it. And I haven’t talked to him directly, but I think President Trump is against it."

But the Louisiana senator changed gears later in his remarks, arguing that he did not "mean any disrespect," while still urging Starmer to reconsider.

"I shouldn’t have said the bong part, I take it back," Kennedy said. "Please Mr. Prime Minister, don’t do this. Don’t do this. We’ll stand with you in telling the United Nations, who’s so upset with you, to go fill out a hurt feelings report because we’re not doing it. We’ll stand with you."

The prime minister’s office did not immediately respond to a Fox News Digital request for comment.

PORTSMOUTH, Va. (WAVY) — Wanda Davis waits to fulfill her husband's final wish, ready but unable.

Samuel Sneed spent 21 years in the Navy, retiring as a chief petty officer. In recent years, he met Davis and let her know that when the time came, he wanted to be buried at sea.

By late December 2023, he was in a Raleigh hospital with liver cancer.

"We got married in the hospital," Davis said in a Wednesday interview. "We had a very lovely wedding. I miss him dearly. He was my all. We were supposed to grow together."

Davis then set out looking for a funeral home that would not only handle a burial at sea, but one involving a full body casket. Neither Sneed nor Davis wanted cremation.

Davis found that Sturtevant Funeral Home on Portsmouth Boulevard has handled numerous burials at sea, and started the arrangements in January 2024. But Sneed's remains are still there because the Navy has been unable for the past 13 months to accommodate the burial.

Funeral Director Robie Gardner said he can't understand the delay.

"It's been a year and he's still here," he said. "I think that's hard for anybody to think that their loved one is just sitting here in our facility, not going out to sea like he requested."

When Navy families come to Sturtevant these days, Gardner makes sure they look at the process of burial at sea with open eyes.

"I would discourage them from doing that," Gardner said. "I don't think that my refrigeration is very dignified for veterans choosing to be buried at sea."

"It's been horrible because there's no closure," Davis said. "It's not fair."

Cmdr. Dawn Stakus, the public affairs officer for Naval Air Force Atlantic, responded to WAVY Wednesday afternoon.

"The Navy acknowledges the long waiting period and the backlog," she said, adding that the Navy is working to find time in ships' schedules.

Stakus said a full-casket burial at sea requires either an aircraft carrier or a large-deck amphibious assault ship.

"The Navy considers the burials at sea very, very important," she said. "Our hearts go out to the families."

According to Military One Source, cremation ceremonies at sea far outnumber casket ceremonies.

Davis is hoping to hear an update soon.

"How much longer? We thought it would be a couple of months," Davis said, "and now they tell me 18 months, and then they say they don't know when."

A U.S. Navy veteran in Jacksonville, Florida, is enjoying a home designed to meet his needs and make life easier.

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Remains of 55 of the 67 victims have been recovered, officials said on Sunday as they prepared to lift the wreckage of the jet out of the Potomac River on Monday.

Britain's Royal Navy confirmed Sunday the seventh and final Astute-class nuclear-powered attack submarine, previously named HMS Agincourt, will now be called HMS Achilles in a move already described as "craven political correctness" because it seeks to spare French blushes by no longer recalling one of England’s greatest military victories.

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No one outside Kansas City wants to see the Chiefs dominate in the playoffs anymore. However, one frequent KC postseason fixture is winning the internet.

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As President-elect Donald Trump approaches his second inauguration, does he have a plan for his second-term "legacy achievements" in mind?

Trump already holds the title for "biggest upset win in a presidential election ever" as a result of Trump’s 2016 besting of Hillary Clinton.

Trump is also never going to be dislodged from the title of "greatest political comeback in American history," a title he took from his old friend Richard Nixon.

And Trump is already the most significant president ever when it comes to turning the United States Supreme Court in a dramatically new direction—in Trump’s case, back to the actual text and public meaning of the Constitution—a legacy which may deepen and extend even further into the future if retirements follow the end of this SCOTUS term or next.

Trump will almost certainly put two new and different markers on the board. If the GOP holds its Senate majority in 2026, Trump will almost certainly top the record for total number of federal judges appointed over the course of a presidency, which is currently 383, held by Ronald Reagan, which is currently 149 ahead of the 234 total judges Trump appointed in his first term.

As for federal appeals court judges, Trump’s first term saw 54 nominees to those benches confirmed, just one shy of the total Barack Obama saw confirmed in his eight years as president. Trump should end up with greatest number of federal appeals court judges appointed, probably within three months of taking the oath of office again. (President Biden appointed one Supreme Court justice and 45 appeals court judges. Those 45 are of course obliged to follow the law as declared by the Supreme Court.)

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When "the Wall" is complete, Trump will almost certainly attend the completion of its last section, and for as long as anyone reading this is alive, the Wall will be the country’s visible expression of an invisible national resolve to control our own borders.

Trump’s second economic boom will follow aggressive deregulation and the energy production and housing construction deregulation ignites.

The one area where Trump did not succeed in his first term? His promise, often repeated, to expand the U.S. Navy to 355 ships while revitalizing ship building via the expansion and modernization of the dry docks and graving docks the expanding fleet needs. He was making a start at the end of his first term when Ambassador Robert O’Brien, a "navalist," was Trump’s national security advisor and doing everything he could to help Trump move the DOD bureaucracy to get serious about ships but Trump ran out of time. He gets a second at-bat on this goal and this legacy.

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Making America’s Navy as great as it has ever been is a big lift for Trump but one he can obtain if he begins on January 20. He can message this goal in his second inaugural address and can hammer on it every day by asking his senior staff every morning: "What did we do for the Navy yesterday and what are we going to do for it today?"

According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies—easily the equal of any think tank that dives deep into national security matters—"China now possesses the world’s largest maritime fighting force, operating 234 warships to the U.S. Navy’s 219."

There’s more bad news. "About 70 percent of Chinese warships were launched after 2010, while only about 25 percent of the U.S. Navy’s were," the CSIS report noted. "Chinese ship production dwarfs that of the United States. The Office of Naval Intelligence assessment noted that China has ‘dozens’ of commercial shipyards larger and more productive than the largest U.S. shipyards, and an unclassified U.S. Navy briefing slide suggested that China has 230 times the shipbuilding capacity of the United States. China’s massive shipbuilding industry would provide a strategic advantage in a war that stretches beyond a few weeks, allowing it to repair damaged vessels or construct replacements much faster than the United States, which continues to face a significant maintenance backlog and would probably be unable to quickly construct many new ships or to repair damaged fighting ships in a great power conflict."

Read the whole CSIS assessment and be very alarmed and correctly so. Trump has consistently aimed for the sort of seapower legacy that marked the greatest presidencies of the 20th century—TR, FDR, and Reagan. All three of these leaders understood at their core that the United States is first and foremost a "seapower," and that maintaining dominance of the world’s waterways is essential to American strength and endurance in the face of many global adversaries, most especially the only superpower peer: The People’s Republic of China. (TR and FDR had the advantage of having been Assistant Secretaries of the Navy earlier in their careers.)

Trump knows Xi Jinping, the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, the ruthless leader of a ruthless regime. Trump isn’t afraid of Xi but would certainly prefer to manage the tensions between our nation and the Chinese Communist Party rather than have them explode into conflict. "Making America Great Again" necessarily includes avoiding a war with China and that in turn means maintaining our strategic superiority over the People’s Liberation Army and the People’s Liberation Army Navy ("PLAN").  

Mackenzie Eaglen and Brady Africa of the American Enterprise Institute recently assessed both our Navy and the PLAN and concluded that "China has been investing so much in shipbuilding over the past 18 years that it can now build more ships in a month than the United States can in a year — and Beijing aims to keep widening its advantage."

"If the U.S. military does not soon catch up to this capacity, it risks finding itself off-guard and ill-equipped in a conflict scenario," the continued. "China’s recent expansions should alarm American military planners and spur investments to bolster naval power."

Trump can join TR and Reagan as godfather of fleet which primarily deters wars, but also can support winning them. When Woodrow Wilson first sent a half dozen destroyers to join the Allies in World War One, the first six destroyers to reach Ireland and join the battle against the Kaiser’s U-boats were the USS McDougal (Destroyer #54); USS Conyngham (Destroyer #58); USS Porter (Destroyer #59); USS Wadsworth (Destroyer #60), and USS Davis (Destroyer #62). All six of these ships were built between 1913 and 1916. When Wilson finally reacted to unrestricted warfare on all shipping and to the revelation of the "Zimmerman telegraph," he had the destroyers at hand to dispatch to the Channel and the waters nearby. 

The Germans’ secret diplomatic communication issued from the German Foreign Office on January 17, 1917. The telegram was intercepted by the Royal Navy, and it proposed a military contract between the German Empire and Mexico if the United States entered World War I against Germany, one that argued that Mexico should gain Texas, New Mexico and Arizona from the United States. The telegram was sent from the Kaiser’s foreign office to his Ambassador in Mexico City and laid down blunt instructions: 

"On February 1 we intend to begin submarine warfare without restriction. In spite of this it is our intention to endeavour to keep the United States neutral. If this attempt is not successful, we propose an alliance on the following basis with Mexico:

That we shall make war together and together make peace; we shall give general financial support, and it is understood that Mexico is to reconquer her lost territory of New Mexico, Texas and Arizona. The details are left to you for settlement."

Wilson received the contents of the telegram in late February of 2017 and chose to release it to the public and America’s entry into the war followed.

We don’t need a Zimmerman Telegraph to alert us to Xi’s plan. He’s building ports in Peru and Namibia to support a blue-water PLAN and new ships suited to the invasion of Taiwan. Trump’s best way to go down in history as a "peace-maker," is to throw much of his vast energy at rebuilding our power on, above, and under the seas.

Hugh Hewitt is host of "The Hugh Hewitt Show," heard weekday mornings 6am to 9am ET on the Salem Radio Network, and simulcast on Salem News Channel. Hugh wakes up America on over 400 affiliates nationwide, and on all the streaming platforms where SNC can be seen. He is a frequent guest on the Fox News Channel’s news roundtable hosted by Bret Baier weekdays at 6pm ET. A son of Ohio and a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School, Hewitt has been a Professor of Law at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law since 1996 where he teaches Constitutional Law. Hewitt launched his eponymous radio show from Los Angeles in 1990.  Hewitt has frequently appeared on every major national news television network, hosted television shows for PBS and MSNBC, written for every major American paper, has authored a dozen books and moderated a score of Republican candidate debates, most recently the November 2023 Republican presidential debate in Miami and four Republican presidential debates in the 2015-16 cycle. Hewitt focuses his radio show and his column on the Constitution, national security, American politics and the Cleveland Browns and Guardians. Hewitt has interviewed tens of thousands of guests from Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to Republican Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump over his 40 years in broadcast, and this column previews the lead story that will drive his radio/ TV show today.

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