While attempting to take off in his presidential helicopter, Donald Trump was briefly grounded when the vehicle experienced a technical failure.
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Marine One, as the presidential helicopter is known, was set to take Donald Trump to yet another golf resort. So far, this presidential term, he has spent around $26 million of the taxpayers' hard-earned cash on his golf outings. Trump was on his way to burn through more of it when his helicopter experienced a mechanical issue.
The incident occurred at Miami International Airport just after he had climbed down from Air Force One. As he boarded Marine One, it prepared for takeoff. While it moved down the runway, it abruptly stopped and began to power down.
On further inspection, it appeared that the helicopter Trump was supposed to be flying in had a flat tire. However, that didn't delay Trump's travel plans for long, he found another helicopter to commander. The president then continued with his original travel plans.
Trump Takes Helicopter To Another Golfing Trip
It seems that not even the president is immune from issues with aircraft. Lately, it seems like the aircraft industry has had a host of problems, although statistics show that plane crashes are actually trending downward globally.
The most prominent of this was when an Army helicopter crashed into an American Airlines flight at Ronald Reagan airport in DC. The resulting crash killed 67 people and proved to be one of the most deadly US crashes in recent memory.
At the time, Trump blamed the Army helicopter for the crash.
"For some reason, you had a helicopter that was at the same height and going at an angle that was unbelievably bad when the air traffic controller said, 'Do you see ?' he was talking about ?' do you see him?'" Trump said. "You had a pilot problem from the standpoint of the helicopter because it was, it was a very clear night."
"The people in the helicopter should have seen where they were going," Trump said. "What was the helicopter doing in that track? Very sad. But visually, somebody should have been able to see and taken that helicopter out of play and the should have been at a different height."
Of course, it's worth noting that the Trump Administration began firing hundreds of Federal Aviation Administration employees in February. Critics of this move have cited the already stretched thin industry, highlighting the negative impact this would have. Compared to the tragedy mentioned above, Trump's helicopter incident is minor. Still, it's shocking that the aircraft was routinely inspected before he got on board.
