Two Marine Corps jets made an emergency jettison off the coast of Australia this week, releasing four unarmed bombs into the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, according to NBC News. The jets were AV-8B Harriers undergoing a training mission on July 16. They were originally planned to drop the bombs on a range on Townshend Island. However when the time came to do so, the pilots were told that the range had not been cleared. After several attempts, they ran low on fuel and realized it wouldn't be possible to land the jets with the bombs they were carrying. "They chose to save the aircraft,” one U.S. official said.
