(Bloomberg) -- Seven U.S. Marines and four soldiers are missing after a Black Hawk helicopter accident during a training exercise conducted out of Eglin Air Force Base in the Florida panhandle.
The aircraft and crew were reported missing about 8:30 p.m. Tuesday and debris was located at about 2 a.m. Wednesday, according to a Pentagon statement. The accident occurred over water, either over the Gulf of Mexico or a more sheltered sound in a 20-square-mile area where the military conducts training missions, Sara Vidoni, an Eglin Air Force Base spokeswoman, said in an interview with CNN.
[Related: Risks in Focus: Aviation]
“The accident is still obviously under investigation. There was fog last evening,” she said. Investigators don’t know if the weather played a role in the accident, she said.
Search and rescue efforts are under way at the accident site; names of those involved haven’t been released.
Two UH-60 helicopters, also known as Black Hawks, and four soldiers involved in the training are assigned to the 1-244th Assault Helicopter Battalion of the U.S. Army National Guard in Hammond, Louisiana. The seven Marines missing were from a special operations regiment at Camp LeJeune, North Carolina.
One helicopter was involved in an accident near Eglin range site A-17, east of the Navarre Bridge in northwest Florida. The second helicopter returned to base with its crew.
Black Hawk helicopters are made by United Technologies Corp.’s Sikorsky unit, which is also developing the next presidential helicopter.
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