#news Pilot confirmed killed in Alaska fighter jet crash

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By Yereth Rosen

ANCHORAGE | Fri Nov 19, 2010 11:23pm EST

ANCHORAGE (Reuters) - The Air Force confirmed on Friday that the pilot of a fighter jet that crashed in Alaska earlier this week during a nighttime training mission perished in the accident.

Air Force officials initially had held out hope that the pilot of the F-22 Raptor, Captain Jeffrey Haney, might have ejected from the plane and survived Tuesday night's crash.

"Based on evidence recovered from the crash site, and after two days of extensive aerial and ground search efforts, we know that Captain Haney did not eject from the aircraft prior to impact," Colonel Jack McMullen, commander of the Air Force 3rd Wing at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, said in a statement.

Search teams at the wreckage site, about 100 miles north of Anchorage, found part of Haney's ejection seat and several items the pilot wore during the flight, McMullen said.

"Sadly, we can no longer consider this a search and rescue operation but must now focus on recovery operations," he said.

At a news conference, McMullen said the crash left a hole in the earth, and that most of what remains of the aircraft is below ground level. An aerial photo of the crash site showed a fairly round crater in the forest, surrounded by blackened trees.

Radar contact with Haney's aircraft was lost as the jet and another plane were returning to their home base at Elmendorf. The wreckage was spotted the next morning by an Alaska National Guard helicopter crew.

The Raptor, a single-seat, twin-engine fighter built by Lockheed Martin, is equipped with stealth technology.

(Writing by Steve Gorman; Editing by Peter Bohan)

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