You may recall a month or so ago, there was what was described as a minor incident, when Obama's campaign plane made an unscheduled landing in St Louis, for what was described as a minor incident: the aft inflatable emergency exit slide deployed in the tail cone. This was described as not an emergency and not an incident affecting the safety of the flight.
Funny story; not so much:
[The pilot] no longer had full control of the plane's up and down movements, [and] told an FAA air traffic controller "at this time we would like to declare an emergency and also have CFR [crash equipment] standing by. ... Be advised we have Senator Obama on board the aircraft."Now this was an MD-81, essentially the same plane as Alaska Air Flight 261, which also had pitch control issues and wound up plunging into the Pacific Ocean. Although in that case the loss of control was due to a different cause, a broken jackscrew, the symptom experienced in the air was the same. With that history in mind, how much must those pilots have been crapping in their pants? Still, the problem was resolved and they did land safely, and Obama's new ride is a more modern and safer 757, so all is well.
Except that my next flight to Chicago is scheduled to be on the same type of plane. I hate the MD-80's and 90's. They're small and cramped and loud, old, dingy and, it would appear, unsafe. I can't wait till the major carriers retire them all.