Osprey Aircraft Deployed at U.S. Military Base in Tokyo

October 1, 2018

Tokyo- Five CV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor transport aircraft were officially deployed at the U.S. Air Force's Yokota base in western Tokyo suburbs on Monday.

This marked the first Osprey deployment to a U.S. military base in Japan outside the southernmost prefecture of Okinawa.

The Ospreys are expected to conduct exercises including low-altitude flights, raising anxieties among local residents.

One of the five Ospreys made an emergency landing at Amami Airport in Kagoshima Prefecture, southwestern Japan, due to engine trouble during a flight from the Yokota base to the U.S. Air Force's Kadena base in Okinawa in June.

On Sunday, about 60 citizen activists staged a rally near the Yokota base against the Osprey deployment. Toshiyuki Obora, 61-year-old leader of the group, warned of the danger of the aircraft, saying: "No country other than Japan hosts so many Ospreys. An accident can happen anywhere."

A total of 10 CV-22 Ospreys and some 450 personnel will be deployed at the Yokota base in stages by around 2024, according to the Japanese Defense Ministry.

Initially, the U.S. military planned to deploy three CV-22 Ospreys at the Yokota base in the second half of 2017, but the plan was once put back to 2019 or 2020.

The U.S. military has moved up the deployment schedule, apparently taking the security situation in East Asia into account, informed sources said.

The U.S. Air Force's CV-22 Ospreys are expected to be used under tougher conditions than the U.S. Marine Corps' MV-22 Ospreys stationed at its Futenma base in Okinawa.

While the basic performance of the two models is the same, the CV-22 Osprey is equipped with radars for low-altitude flights at night.

In September, a council made of officials from the Tokyo metropolitan government and six local municipalities asked the ministry to provide sufficient information about the Ospreys' exercises and ensure their safety, citing residents' worries about the aircraft.

In December 2016, an MV-22 Osprey deployed at the Futenma base crashed off the coast of the Okinawa city of Nago.

The Japanese ministry plans to deploy 17 Ospreys at Saga airport in southwestern Japan by fiscal 2021 for use by the Ground Self-Defense Force, but talks with a local fishery cooperative have made little headway. Jiji Press