George W. Bush Jiang Zemin The Hainan Island incident was a ten-day international incident between the United States and the People's Republic of China (PRC) that resulted from a mid-air collision between a United States Navy EP-3E ARIES II signals intelligence aircraft and a Chinese Air Force J-8 interceptor on April 1, 2001.

The EP-3 was forced to make an emergency landing on Hainan without permission from the PRC, and its 24 crew members were detained and interrogated by Chinese authorities until a statement was delivered by the United States government regarding the incident.

[3] The United States and the People's Republic of China disagree on the legality of the overflights by U.S. naval aircraft of the area where the incident occurred.

The United States remains neutral in this dispute, but patrols the sea regularly with naval ships and airplanes, during what it terms freedom of navigation operations.

The PRC interprets the convention as allowing it to preclude other nations' military operations within this area, but the United States does not recognize China's claim for the Paracel Islands and maintains that the Convention grants free navigation for all countries' aircraft and ships, including military aircraft and ships, within a country's exclusive economic zone.

[6] The island also houses a large signals intelligence facility that tracks civil and military activity in the area and monitors traffic from commercial communications satellites.

[7] The United States has long kept the island under surveillance; on May 22, 1951, for example, RAF Spitfire PR Mk 19s based at Hong Kong's Kai Tak Airport flew photo-reconnaissance missions at the behest of U.S. naval intelligence.

At about 9:15 a.m. local time, toward the end of the EP-3's six-hour ELINT mission, it was flying at 22,000 feet (6,700 m) and 180 knots (210 mph; 330 km/h), on a heading of 110°, about 70 miles (110 km) away from the island.

[14] For the next 26 minutes, the crew of the EP-3 performed an emergency plan which included destroying sensitive items aboard the aircraft, such as electronic equipment related to intelligence-gathering, documents and data.

[16] Wang was seen to eject after the collision, but the Pentagon said that the damage to the underside of the EP-3 could mean that the cockpit of the Chinese fighter jet was crushed, making it impossible for the pilot to survive.

Both the cause of the collision and the assignment of blame were disputed: Neither claim can be verified since the Chinese government did not release data from the flight recorders of either aircraft, both of which are in its possession.

Guarded closely, they were taken to a military barracks at Lingshui where they were interrogated for two nights before being moved to lodgings in Haikou, the provincial capital and largest city on the island.

Honeck and Vignery worked up humorous routines based on the television shows The People's Court, Saturday Night Live and The Crocodile Hunter.

Some of the material they failed to destroy included cryptographic keys, signals intelligence manuals, and the names of National Security Agency employees.

[12] Some of the captured computers contained detailed information for processing PROFORMA communications from North Korea, Russia, Vietnam, China and other countries.

[39] In addition to paying for the dismantling and shipping of the EP-3, the United States paid US$34,567 for the 11 days of food and lodging supplied by the Chinese government to the aircraft's crew.

[41] The United States tried to be conciliatory in order to try to avoid Chinese objections to U.S. foreign policy, which became more important after the September 11 attacks and at the beginning of the War on Terror.

[47][48] In August 2014, the U.S. protested when a Chinese Shenyang J-11BH came within 10 meters (30 ft) of a patrolling Boeing P-8 Poseidon aircraft and performed aerobatic maneuvers including a barrel roll.

[49] In May 2016, the U.S. protested when two Shenyang J-11BH aircraft reportedly came within 15 meters (50 ft) of a U.S. EP-3 on "a routine" patrol approximately 50 miles (80 km) east of Hainan Island.