Kara Spears Hultgreen (October 5, 1965 – October 25, 1994), was a lieutenant in the United States Navy and the first female naval carrier-based fighter pilot. She died just months after she was certified for combat, when she crashed her F-14 Tomcat into the sea on final approach to USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72). A formal investigation found that the cause of the crash was primarily pilot error following an engine failure.