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When a US Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle was shot down over Iran last Friday, both the pilot and the weapon systems officer bailed out over hostile territory.

Their fight for survival began the moment their plane came under enemy fire, from the intense ejection to the evasion of hostiles on the ground as they awaited rescue.

The jet’s pilot was rescued by US forces within hours, but the WSO was stranded in enemy territory for two days, signaling American rescue teams while avoiding the Iranians who were out looking for him.

The shootdown, the first fighter jet loss to enemy fire in this war, and the complex rescue that followed show why pilot survival training is as critical as air combat skills.

Ejection Training

Military aviators regularly undergo refresher training on surviving aircraft emergencies, from what to do when oxygen levels drop dangerously low to escaping a downed aircraft at sea, said Vincent Aiello, a retired Navy fighter pilot and former TOPGUN instructor.

“Flying a high-performance fighter jet is a full-contact sport,” he told Business Insider. “It’s very difficult on your body.”

Safe ejection preparation begins with body positioning. Because an ejection seat goes through what Aiello described as a “controlled explosion,” even small deviations can cause severe injury. The seat rockets a pilot out of the cockpit in a fraction of a second, generating forces strong enough to compress the spine and leave lasting damage.

An improper position of an aviator’s body can be fatal.

Aiello recalled being in an ejection simulator in one of his early training sessions — sensors detected if an elbow or foot was even a hair out of position, mistakes that in a real scenario could prove extremely harmful, he said.

“It’s not just the explosion,” he said — a pilot is “riding this blast wave” and can be thrown into the aircraft’s slipstream, which may be moving at hundreds of miles per hour.

An ejection is a multi-step process. After the ejection handle is pulled, the cockpit canopy blasts off and then a rocket motor under the aviator’s seat fires to carry them safely away from the aircraft before releasing a parachute.

The process is intense and disorienting, Aiello explained, and is made even more difficult with military parachutes that are designed more for survivability than for easy maneuverability and soft landings, like sport parachutes.

“You’re almost guaranteed to be injured, but you should be alive,” he said. “And that’s the point, you don’t go down with the ship. You get out, albeit violently, but you’re alive.”

SERE Training

Getting out of the jet is only the first hurdle if a pilot goes down in unfriendly territory — what happens in the minutes and hours immediately after landing can determine whether a pilot makes it home.

All US military aviators and aircrew undergo SERE training — short for “Survive, Evade, Resist, Escape.” The program, also required for personnel assigned to special operations units and others, prepares service members for isolation and potential captivity.

Much of the training was shaped by lessons from the Korean and Vietnam wars, when thousands of American service members, including pilots and aircrew, were taken prisoner and subjected to torture and inhumane conditions. Back then, there was little formal preparation for what troops might face.

Today, multiple SERE schools train military personnel how to survive being captured by an enemy and follow a similar concept — after classroom instruction, students spend several days living off the land before attempting to evade simulated enemy forces. They then undergo a “capture” and experience a prisoner-of-war camp environment, where they are tested through interrogations and propaganda scenarios.

Part of that means realistic stress for troops who must stick to the “code of conduct” for POWs, a set of rules meant to guide captured personnel through interrogations and torture, and to resist divulging sensitive information. Service members must also demonstrate their ability to maintain discipline and morale under sustained psychological pressure.

In a conflict against a nation with advanced air defenses, the odds of ejecting into hostile territory rise sharply, making the training critical. The US has degraded Iranian air defenses, giving it air superiority, but that doesn’t completely eliminate the risk, as Friday’s incident shows.

“Whether you’re in the jungle, the Arctic, or the desert, you’re learning a mindset,” explained James Reeman, a retired Air National Guard F-16 pilot. “How am I going to be mentally prepared if things go wrong?” It’s an extreme example of being tested to personal limits, with sleep deprivation and simulated interrogations.

The experience of evading and resisting in small teams creates strong bonds, he said, and leaves little room for any big egos.

“You’re at your wits end, and they do a really good job of making you think it’s real,” he said.

“The last thing you expect is to get shot down,” said John Waters, who previously flew with the Air Force’s F-16 Viper Demonstration Team. But the unexpected can’t be where everything falls apart. Instead, that’s where pilots and aircrews lean hardest on their training.

The US military invests heavily in keeping pilots alive, not just because of the human cost. Experienced aviators are among its most expensive and difficult assets to replace.

SERE training places aviators in high-stress environments specifically to test whether they can regain composure quickly and manage unpredictable interactions.

In today’s conflicts, the first people a downed pilot meets may be civilians with smartphones, not soldiers, adding a new layer of unpredictability.

Following a friendly fire incident involving three F-15s in early March, right after the start of the war with Iran, video footage began circulating online showing what was said to be locals in Kuwait encountering the downed American pilots.

Waters pointed to the footage of a pilot raising their hands as the locals approached as an example of de-escalation under pressure. Pilots fly with sidearms in case they find themselves in an emergency on the ground— but knowing when to engage and when not to is critical.

“This is obviously one of the worst ways this could have ended,” Waters said of the friendly fire incident that downed three F-15s on March 1. However, “it could have been much worse if this had happened over territory where people weren’t friendly, or where there wasn’t a friendly government.”

That much worse scenario is what the F-15 crew faced after being shot down inside Iran. Both airmen had to hold their own while they waited for recovery in two separate, harrowing rescue missions.