Federal officials knew that sending two fighter jets and a 747 from the presidential fleet to buzz ground zero and Lady Liberty might set off nightmarish fears of a 9/11 replay, but they still ordered the photo-op kept secret from the public. In a memo obtained by CBS 2 HD, the Federal Aviation Administration’s James Johnston said the agency was aware of “the possibility of public concern regarding DOD (Department of Defense) aircraft flying at low altitudes” in an around New York City. But they demanded total secrecy from the NYPD, the Secret Service, the FBI and even the mayor’s office and threatened federal sanctions if the secret got out. “To say that it should not be made public knowing that it might scare people it’s just confounding,” Sen. Charles Schumer said. “It’s what gives Washington and government a bad name. It’s sheer stupidity.”
The flyover — apparently ordered by the White House Office of Military Affairs so it would have souvenir photos of Air Force One with the Statue of Liberty in the background — had President Obama seeing red. He ordered a probe and apologized.
The cost of the frivolous flight was about $60,000 an hour and that was just for the presidential aircraft. That doesn’t include the cost of the two F-16s that came along. The flight by the VC-25, a modified Boeing Co. 747, and two F-16 fighter jets cost $328,835, Air Force spokeswoman Vicki Stein said. That includes $300,658 for the larger plane, which flew a three-hour mission, and about $28,178 for the F-16 jets, which flew 1.8 hours each, Stein said in an e-mailed statement.
The NYPD was so upset about the demand for secrecy that Police Commissioner Ray Kelly vowed never to follow such a directive again and he accused the feds of inciting fears of a 9/11 replay.
So are we being used as guinea pigs? Was this just a Psyop to see how we would react? It wouldn’t surprise me.
Crap. They couldn’t photoshop that and safe tax payers all that money and pain.
You would have thought they would have told the populace, and the radio stations if this was really planned like such.
Yeahhhhhhh…..right.
pedro… you actually think the President personally supervises PR events by the “White House Office of Military Affairs so it would have souvenir photos of Air Force One with the Statue of Liberty in the background”?
lame…
I liked Scalzi’s take on the first 100 days.
http://whatever.scalzi.com/2009/04/29/obamas-first-100-days-a-complete-and-utter-failure/
Now THAT’s stuff you can blame on Obama.
The feds were looking for a shipment of stingers that they lost, in 1987.
This does strike me as some sort of Psyop, but what was the objective? Were there predictable stock fluctuations caused by the incident? Did some sort of major financial transaction take place while everyone was running around in a panic?
We now know that panic was apparently the objective, but -why-?
Obama, change we can believe in, or at least be terrified of. ROFL.
So…the FAA can’t ID Airforce one to know it isn’t some random jet…and no one bothered to call local police to see if freaking Airforce one had been stolen? Seriously?! Sure the FAA should have known…all that…but this thing got so blown out of proportion
And…why was this even done? To get a souvenir photo of the plane with the Statue of Liberty in the frame?!?!?
Does no one have Photoshop?
Lame and Lamer.
Curious to see how much flak Obama gets for this. If Bush had still been in office, there would all kinds of calls of some kind of sinister plot to frighten the public. Dems would be calling for investigations and the media would be on this for at least a month.
# 5 Thank you, XD in the extreme.
You know, it’s probably not even worth explaining that the plane and pilot had to fly anyway to maintain qualification. It was a regularly scheduled operation.
The stupidity was in trying to turn it into a photo op.
Y’all might tear a hole in your tinfoil hats.
“He ordered a probe..”, the facts already exist. No punishments will come out this. Remember it is a 24 hour news cycle, you will all forget about this by next week.
I wonder if the photo’s will become a collectors item.
#13. Weak explanation at best, oh supreme one.
For that kind of money, they could have had a few hundred variations of the photo-op around the country. My reaction to a picture of a plane flying that low over the lower end of Manhatten and the outer harbor is nervousness. There ain’t no airport calling for a low flying plane in the vicinity.
Did Obama know in advance? No, nor should he have been. The person who required the secrecy though should be fired for this expensive fly over and requiring the secrecy in the first place. If he can’t do a simple photo-op right, he isn’t fit to lead his office.
The Bush White House was full of incompetents and fools, starting with the CIC, and deserved blame for most of what happened.
It seems the people running the white house are more interested in PR than in the real job of running the country.
we have a President who cant give a simple speach with out a teleprompter , a white house staff mostly pulled from PR firms not from Industry and heads of cabinet positions with little or no experience in their field
we got change alright I just hope we survive it
Hmmm, The Commander in Chief of the armed forces should never know what orders are issued by the head of the White House Office of Military Affairs.
Oh, now someone is blaming Bush. (post #17)
Lame excise #3 & #4.
#13 said: Y’all might tear a hole in your tinfoil hats.
Yeah, sure. Divebombing the city of New York at 500 feet with a 747 followed by 2 F-21 chase planes is a just a normal event.
Get real!
uhhh #17…There was this election, and we got a new administration? Perhaps you heard somewhere?
#22 – He’s just honing the excuse for when Obama totals the US economy & industry.
Um, no, he shouldn’t know every order given. The whole point of chain of command is that only issues or higher importance should filter up to the top levels of the command structure.
If O was himself directing photo ops, -that- would make me worried that he wasn’t doing his job right.
# 24 Li said, “The whole point of chain of command is that only issues or higher importance should filter up to the top levels of the command structure.”
Umm, this order falls under that criteria. Fail.
I think #13–god has it mostly right. Air crews waste money all the time in training missions. Nothing wrong with taking pictures of the flight either.
The stupidity here was ONLY keeping it a secret. “Transparency” in government operations would have made a “big deal” of it and promoted and advertised it. Get your camera and get ready to take pictures of AF-1 flying over the Statue of Liberty.
It would be nice if people in power could learn to pull their heads out of their asses, but then they wouldn’t be in government would they?
I was referring to #11, who played the Bush card.
Paddy, anything useful to add, or just trolling today?
You Obama naysayers are so just grasping at straws you have got nothing
This still summed it up (Louis Caldera, Director of the White House Military Office, took responsibility for the incident, saying he approved the “mission” last week. “Last week, I approved a mission over New York. I take responsibility for that decision,” he said, “While federal authorities took the proper steps to notify state and local authorities in New York and New Jersey, it’s clear that the mission created confusion and disruption. I apologize and take responsibility for any distress that flight caused.”)
Mistake made, buck stopped on the right desk, apology made & accepted, lessons learned. Move along nothing to see.
Even I wouldn’t think of blaming Bush for this if he was still in office and I can still smell the sulfur from that administration.
Gee’sh no wonder only 1 in 5 Americans claim to be Republicans what a bunch of losers. Go out and find a real issue or two that you have a better plan to solve hint just about all of your past plans failed need new ones. Convince us that they are better plans and you might get back in office. Just saying the sky is falling will cause us to look up and see your acid rain bad plan.
I’m pulling for you we are all in this together.
Hah, hah. If your browser opens up with only the top half of the picture showing, it looks like a missle has been launched towards AF-1. I had to scroll down to confirm what I was seeing!!
Yep, Paddy-O-Alfie is demonstrating his powers of delegation by keeping the President in Charge of all details. I’d bet even most of the 20% disdain Paddy-O-Alfie until I see him making love to Paddy-O-Alfie every time he gets a chance. Those two are inseparable. Hard Core I think they call it.
#31
think about this pedro
only 1 in 5 best for you to vote for those who support minority rights
#18 PMitchell. Can we end the whole teleprompter bullet point? They all use them and there have been plenty of times where he’s spoken with out one. It’s not his fault he can read. You just sound kind of moronic like when Fred Thompson read the speech off the teleprompter where he criticized Obama for using a teleprompter.
Couldn’t they have saved hundreds of thousands of dollars by contracting this site to provide them a photo for $50,000? You guys could then pay $20,000 to the site you copy it from.
I agree with Bobbo #26! This could have been quite the feel good op for the ‘O’ Administration.
I don’t see a downside to letting every one know.
Make that FORMER federal officials.
All I know is that if I see air force one circling and it has fighter escort, either we just got attacked again, or the ICBM’s are flying.