A low-flying Boeing 747 buzzed Washington, D.C., on Thursday evening for President Donald Trump’s White House Halloween event, startling residents and local officials.
The plane was the 747 gifted to Trump by Qatar, which becomes Air Force One when the president is aboard, and it flew between about 400 and 1,000 feet over the capital and passed over the White House twice, according to flight tracking data cited by the Washington Post.
The D.C. Council, the district’s 13-member legislature, posted video of the flyover on social media, saying that people downtown, at the Pentagon and at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport got only 15 minutes’ notice. The council said the low-flying plane startled many residents, including its own officials.
Commenters on the Post’s article said the sight had them worrying about a 9/11-style attack, and the newspaper noted that Washington’s airspace is more restricted than anywhere else in the country, which makes a low-flying plane especially alarming.
The White House’s Rapid Response 47 account on X called it “An epic Air Force One flyover at the White House for the trick-or-treaters!” A video posted by the account showed Donald and Melania Trump waving at the aircraft outside the White House as a version of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” played.
A Federal Aviation Administration spokesperson told the Post that the flyover had been coordinated with the agency and that National Airport briefly halted flights to accommodate it.
Trump has long been fond of flyovers. In June, helicopters and other aircraft flew over the capital for a military parade marking the nation’s 250th birthday. A plane used as Air Force One also took part in a July 4 flyover in 2019.
Many social media users were unimpressed with the stunt.
“No other president has terrorized DC with flyovers like this,” noted Mother Jones’ Stephanie Mencimer.
“Good perspective of how low BribeJet was yesterday… altho trackers had it lower at times,” observed writer Ian Livingston, sharing a photo of the plane flying over the capital.
“I saw this while driving south on 13th St NW in DC this evening,” stated former White House and CIA staffer Larry Pfeiffer. “I didn’t recognize it as AF1, as it flew by so quickly. I couldn’t imagine why a plane would fly so low over the city, near the White House, and I was waiting to hear a ‘boom.’ Too many years fighting terrorists.”
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