Electrical issue that grounded Trump’s flight raises questions about aging Air Force One aircraft
By Alexandra Skores, CNN
(CNN) — The “electrical issue” aboard Air Force One Tuesday night that forced President Donald Trump’s Europe-bound plane to turn back is raising troubling questions about the age of the decades-old aircraft flying the president.
The Air Force has long been working to upgrade the aging fleet, and Trump has been pushing for changes to the Air Force One program dating back to his first term.
The plane that needed to turn back, a Boeing 747-200B, landed safely in Maryland just after 11 p.m. ET. It is a part of the Air Force’s VC-25A program that includes Air Force One. Trump was in a replacement aircraft roughly an hour later, en route to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
The plane turned back to Joint Base Andrews out of an abundance of caution, according to White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt.
“This has to be one of the best maintained planes in the world,” said Mary Schiavo, CNN transportation analyst. “But there are things on every aircraft where when that warning light comes on you have to turn around and go back and address it.”
The plane in question was first deployed in 1991, according to the Air Force. It’s one of two Boeing planes commissioned to fly the president. Both are more than three decades old and have been long ridiculed by Trump, who wants new ones.
But it’s going to take some more time to get a new plane.
Boeing’s contract to replace two Air Force One jets had an original delivery date of 2022, but that has come and gone with no new plane.
Trump also has his donated Qatari jet in production, which he previously predicted could be ready for his usage by February, however there have been no indications that the plane is about to join the fleet.
Updates on new planes
Trump has long-awaited new planes for presidential use. There are a few different planes that are part of the discussion at this point in addition to the Qatari plane.
The Air Force announced in December it would purchase two additional Boeing jets from the German carrier Lufthansa to support its future presidential airlift program, with delivery dates slated for this year, indicating they’d be used mostly for training.
At a price tag of $400 million, the Air Force said in a statement that it is “procuring two aircraft to support training and spares for the 747-8 fleet” as it prepares to replace the 747-200 models that currently serve as Air Force One in the coming years.
The first plane will be delivered early this year and the second is expected to be delivered before the end of 2026. If the Air Force were to add the planes to the presidential fleet, it will likely take significant time.
Refurbishments on commercial jets that don’t have the strict and complicated requirements of Air Force One can take weeks or months depending on how much work needs to be done and the age of the aircraft. For example, according to aviation website Simply Flying, certain maintenance checks involving the complete disassembly of a plane are done every six to 12 years. That comprehensive inspection typically takes between three to six weeks.
The main replacement option is two additional Boeing 747 planes that were initially intended to be commercial jets but are now being modified in San Antonio as part of the VC-25B program. According to the military, the new planes are expected to “serve as a flying White House for the next 30 years,” replacing the current two.
The new modifications to the 747-8 aircraft are expected to include electrical power upgrades, a mission communication system, a medical facility, executive interior and autonomous ground operations capabilities.
On December 12, the Air Force awarded a $15.5 million modification to its existing contract with Boeing for the VC-25B program. The award brings the face value of the contract to over $4.3 billion.
As of now, the first VC-25B aircraft is projected to be delivered in mid-2028, a timeline that would put the delivery just before the end of Trump’s second term.
Track record of presidential aircraft
Tuesday night’s incident is also not the first time one of the president’s aircraft has endured problems. This week’s incident was the second time in recent months Trump has been forced to turn to a backup aircraft.
During a September visit to the United Kingdom, Trump and first lady Melania Trump safely boarded a support helicopter after the one they were traveling in experienced a hydraulic issue and was forced to land at a local airfield, Leavitt announced at the time.
To resume his trip to Switzerland, the president switched Tuesday to a Boeing C-32A, the US Air Force version of the twin-engine 757 jetliner, often used by the first lady or Cabinet members. The Air Force has four C-32s in its fleet.
The plane that turned the president around Tuesday has a storied history.
On September 11, 2001, former President George W. Bush was interrupted during an event at a Florida elementary school after the attack on the World Trade Center South Tower in New York City and was hurried to the plane. It flew the president to an Air Force base near Shreveport, Louisiana, according to the Miller Center at the University of Virginia, then to a secure bunker on an Air Force base in Nebraska.
It later transported the former president to Washington, DC, where he addressed the nation hours later.
It also once flew Presidents Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush to Israel for the funeral of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995, according to the Air Force.
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