The military aircraft transporting Secretary of State Marco Rubio to the Munich Security Conference in Germany was forced to return to Washington Thursday night after encountering “mechanical problems.”
“Tonight, on the way from Washington to Munich, the plane that Secretary Rubio was flying through had mechanical problems,” State Department spokesman Tammy Bruce said in a statement.
“The plane turns around and is back to Andrews' joint base,” she adds, referring to an air base in Maryland just outside Washington, D.C.
“The secretary will continue his trip to Germany and the Middle East on another aircraft,” Bruce said.
The mechanical problem apparently had something to do with the cockpit windshield of the Air Force Boeing C-32 plane, which occurred about 90 minutes after takeoff.
Axios reported that there was a crack in the windshield but cited US officials and did not raise “safety concerns.”
The flight tracking website showed that Rubio's plane suddenly looked back at the Atlantic off the coast of Maine and maintained an altitude of about 10,000 feet when it returned to Andrews's joint base.
Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jim Lisch (R-Idaho) was also on the plane.
It is unclear whether the changes in the plane will slow the high stakes on Friday morning. It is expected to happen.
The mechanical issues follow the smarts of recent conflicts involving military aircraft.
A $81 million Air Force F-35 fighter jet crashed in a training exercise at Aierson Air Force Base in Alaska late last month, and earlier this week, the Navy EA-18G Growler plunged into California's port of San Diego. Both planes' pilots were able to safely drain before crashing.
On January 29, a US Army helicopter flying along the Potomac River in Washington, DC, collided with American Airlines Jetlanding at Reagan National Airport, killing 67 people.
