Between April 26 and May 26, Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) interceptors interfered with the navigation of a U.S. C-130 Hercules transport aircraft, an Australian P-8 surveillance aircraft, and a Canadian CP-140 Aurora Maritime Patrol Aircraft conducting surveillance off the coast of North Korea. The worst possible outcome from such an encounter is a fatal mid-air collision, which last occurred in April 2001, off the coast of Hainan Island, between a U.S. Air Force EP-3 and a Chinese J-8 fighter aircraft, killing a pilot. Previously, between July 1952 and February 1960, the United States suffered a total of twenty-eight military fatalities in four incidents at sea with China, not including at least a dozen other hostile encounters. In three instances—in 1953, 1956, and 1968—U.S. surveillance aircraft were shot down.
