Yes, I admit it. I ran to the theater to see Harrison Ford in "Air Force One," this summer's blockbuster.
Like everyone who's ridden on the real Air Force One, I was awed by the size and marvels of the plane in the movie. Even more so since a visit to the Air Force Museum at Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio this summer confirmed the tiny dowdiness of the planes that carried Truman, Eisenhower and FDR.The premise of "Air Force One," the movie, is that Russian terrorists, posing as a Russian TV crew, get on the president's plane with the help of a traitorous Secret Service agent, as the plane is leaving Moscow. Harrison Ford plays President James Marshall in an astonishing display of derring do.
All plausible if you forget the midair rescue attempt, the comings and goings by parachute, the fact that most of the technological wizardry worked as it is supposed to.
Of course, even though it was built somewhat to scale and tailored after news pictures shown on TV (plans and security features of Air Force One are top secret), Harrison Ford's plane seems roomier than the Pentagon, more comfortable than the Waldorf Astoria, better stocked than the White House kitchen and certainly more impervious to ricocheting bullets from machine guns than any previously known structure in the universe.
Yes, yes, it's just a movie. But such an entertaining movie that President Clinton says he saw it twice. (As far as he knows, he says, his plane, first flown in by former President Bush, doesn't have an escape pod like the movie version does.) He also says he authorized a tour of the real plane for Ford and his entourage while vacationing in Wyoming and even helped persuade Glenn Close to star in the movie as the loyal vice president.
So what's it like on the real Air Force One?
The designation Air Force One applies to any Air Force plane the president is riding on, but it's usually one of two 225-foot Boeing 747-200s that cost $626 million and were delivered in 1990 and 1991. Also, there are five 707s, several C-9s and Gulfstreams for the use of the president. All are part of the 89th Airlift Wing based at Andrews Air Force Base in Mary-and.
The real plane is surprisingly similar to the movie version, albeit more cramped. While it's not quite as true to life as Michael Douglas' "American President" was in representing the inside of the White House, the layout of the movie plane is correct.
The color scheme is the same. There is a conference room (that seats eight, not several dozen). There are seven lavatories, fax machines, cots for off-duty pilots, TV screens, digital clocks, comfortably padded reclining seats in cabins for senior staff and many VCRs. Ironically, one of the movies taken on board the first time Bush flew on board the real Air Force One was "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade," starring Harrison Ford.
The president has a private office with a wooden desk and swivel leather chair, and the Clintons have a private bedroom with twin couches that convert to beds, and a shower.
There is a medical room where emergency surgery could be performed.
There is space for Secret Service agents to keep their guns, but it's not a full arsenal as in the movie. And the real plane has no parachute ramp or even parachutes.
The real plane has 85 telephones, and the president can often get live TV feeds by satellite. He can make phone calls anywhere in the world or to astronauts in space or admirals in submarines.
There are 2,000 meals aboard, and in-flight refueling is possible after 7,140 miles, so the plane could stay aloft for a week, although it's never been done. There is a jamming system to deflect anti-aircraft missiles and wiring that can withstand the electromagnetic effects of a thermonuclear blast.
Security is tight around Air Force One, which is guarded night and day, but the 70 passengers, including 13 journalists who fly in the rear of the plane, and 23 crew members are not checked by thumbprint as they get on board as they were in the movie. And no longer are foreign journalists permitted to fly on the president's plane.
The real issue is why don't we have a president who can bounce heads together the way Ford does in the movie?
Harrison Ford for president? It's not as if we've never had an actor in the Oval Office before. Movies and real life meet so often that the line between them for millions of people is blurred.