The US president\u2019s plane, Air Force One, has been forced to abort its flight to Switzerland and turn back after what officials described as a \u201cminor electrical issue\u201d.<\/p>\n
Donald Trump boarded another aircraft, an Air Force C-32, a modified Boeing 757 normally used for domestic trips to smaller airports, and continued his trip to the World Economic Forum in Davos shortly after midnight.<\/p>\n
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said the decision to return to Washington DC on Tuesday evening had been taken shortly after departure \u201cout of an abundance of caution\u201d, once the crew detected the fault.<\/p>\n
A White House pool reporter travelling with the president said the lights in the press cabin of Air Force One flickered off briefly after the aircraft became airborne, though no further explanation was provided at the time.<\/p>\n
Members of the media gather after disembarking from Air Force One. Photograph: Jonathan Ernst\/Reuters<\/p>\n
The two ageing jets serving as Air Force One have been in service for nearly four decades, and efforts by Boeing to deliver replacements have been beset by repeated delays.<\/p>\n
Controversy flared in 2025 when Qatar\u2019s ruling family presented Trump with a luxury Boeing 747-8<\/a> to be added to the presidential fleet \u2013 a gesture that drew intense scrutiny. The aircraft is presently being refitted to meet US security standards.<\/p>\n Speaking to reporters onboard on Tuesday night, Leavitt quipped that the Qatari jet was sounding like the \u201cmuch better\u201d option at that moment.<\/p>\n The unscheduled turnaround was expected to delay the president\u2019s arrival in Davos. The meeting is overshadowed by Trump\u2019s threat of tariffs on European countries over Greenland, which he remains determined to seize<\/a>.<\/p>\n Trump told reporters before departing: \u201cLet\u2019s put it this way: it\u2019s going to be a very interesting Davos<\/a>.\u201d Earlier, at a lengthy press briefing celebrating his first anniversary in office, he was asked how far he would be willing to go to acquire Greenland and said only: \u201cYou\u2019ll find out.\u201d<\/p>\n Members of the media after returning to Joint Base Andrews following an electrical problem on Air Force One. Photograph: Jonathan Ernst\/Reuters<\/p>\n The delegation also includes the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, the White House chief of staff, Susie Wiles, the deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller, and the National Economic Council director, Kevin Hassett.<\/p>\n In February 2025, a military plane carrying Rubio to Germany had to return to Washington because of a mechanical issue. In October a military plane carrying the defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, had to make an emergency landing in Britain due to a crack in the windshield<\/a>.<\/p>\n Technical problems on the presidential jet are rare due to meticulous maintenance. In 2006 the primary Air Force One suffered a mechanical malfunction while on the tarmac in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, forcing George W Bush to board the backup aircraft, a Boeing 757, to fly to his next destination in Indonesia.<\/p>\n The Associated Press contributed to this report<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The US president\u2019s plane, Air Force One, has been forced to abort its flight to Switzerland and turn…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":428982,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[64,63,134,427],"class_list":{"0":"post-428981","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=428981"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428981\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/428982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=428981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=428981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=428981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}