An F-35A fighter with Japan's Air Self Defense Force has gone missing while flying over the Pacific Ocean roughly 84 miles from the Japanese mainland.

The single-seat aircraft dropped off radar on Tuesday at about 7:27 p.m. local time, officials told Reuters. A search and rescue operation is apparently now underway, according to NHK.

That's about all that's know thus far, but if the plane is found to have crashed, it would be the second such incident for an F-35.

The first crash, of an F-35B, occurred in South Carolina in September 2018, which led to a temporary grounding of all F-35 aircraft to inspect "suspect fuel tubes" that may have been a factor in that incident.

The potential loss of an F-35A in Japan comes just days after Tokyo stood up its first operational F-35A squadron on March 29. The JASDF's 302nd Squadron, 3rd Air Wing, reportedly consists of more than a dozen F-35A aircraft, according to The Diplomat.

This article by Paul Szoldra originally appeared at Task & Purpose. Follow Task & Purpose on Twitter. This article first appeared in 2019.

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