President Trump’s departure to the Republican midterm convention was delayed on Wednesday after a military aide accidentally triggered the release of the emergency slide from the plane.
The president sat in Marine One on the tarmac of Joint Base Andrews for about 20 minutes while the slide was deployed from the new blue, red, white and gold jet and stayed out, extending from the plane to the tarmac.
“Military personnel accidentally triggered the slide,” a person briefed with the situation said.
Confusing matters, the older blue and white 747 that serves as Air Force One rolled up and stopped a couple hundred meters behind the Qatar-gifted plane. The old Air Force One then deployed its front and rear steps.
Trump downplayed the matter. When he finally exited his helicopter he told reporters at JBA that staff were just testing the slide.
“They were doing a check on the slide, you know, the emergency. So I think it takes about 15 minutes,” he said.
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“They want to make sure everything works perfectly,” he said.
Air Force staff wrestled with the slide as it blew in the wind, trying to get control of the object. Trump boarded the plane for his trip to Dallas and took off without any issues.
In August, the president, when departing a NATO meeting in Turkey, slipped off of his new plane via a catering truck to board a different military aircraft for the departure. Reporters traveling with him were unaware of the bait-and-switch.
The slide was deployed from the right-hand-side door of the Qatari plane, opposite the left-hand-side door that Trump normally enters. That right-hand door was the one in Turkey that the president slipped out of amid a threat from Iran.
Trump, however, expressed his confidence in the new plane despite the fact it doesn’t have some of the anti-defense measures as the older Air Force One.
“Yeah I am,” he responded when asked if he was sure it was safe. “Or I wouldn’t be on it.”
Air Force staff eventually deflated the slide and removed it, carrying it away from the plane so it could take off.
Typically, on a commercial airliner, it can take up to two days to repack the slide and fit it back into its storage area. The plane then usually has to undergo an inspection before it can fly again.
Trump has said the Qatari plane will go out of service for a month or two later this year for security enhancements. He plans to take it to Ireland this weekend for a short trip to the Emerald Isle.
