In the morning, Olaf Scholz sets off on his first trip to South America – and is in the air for around 14 hours. For the new government plane “Konrad Adenauer” it is the first mission in the service of the chancellor, who experienced the pitfalls of the predecessor plane on his own body.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz in SPD left on Saturday with the new government plane “Konrad Adenauer” for his first trip to South America as head of government. The four-day trip begins in the Argentine capital Buenos Aires, then continues to Chile and Brazil. The topics to be discussed include the expansion of economic relations, energy supply and climate protection. For the first time, the Chancellor is traveling in the new “Konrad Adenauer” government aircraft. It is the second A350-900 aircraft to be put into service by the German Armed Forces’ Special Air Mission Wing at the end of last year.
However, it is the first of a total of three of these aircraft to have full VIP facilities, including offices and a lounge area – although the Bundeswehr is keeping quiet about the details. The “Adenauer” is thus effectively regarded as the new “Air Force One” for the German government and the German president. It had already been tested by German President Frank-Walter-Steinmeier on a trip to Brazil at the turn of the year. Now Scholz is traveling for the first time in the white-painted aircraft with black-red-gold stripes.
The “Adenauer” is 67 meters long, 960 kilometers per hour fast, flies more than 13,000 meters high and can reach any destination in the world without a stopover. The 12,000-kilometer journey to Buenos Aires takes 14 hours.
Memories of 2018 mishap flight
Scholz has already traveled to Buenos Aires in a plane called “Konrad Adenauer” – the predecessor of the current “Air Force One” type A340. In 2018, he and then-Chancellor Angela Merkel set off in the plane for the G20 summit, but shortly after takeoff there was a serious breakdown. A defective component – a central switching unit in the on-board electronics – paralyzed two radio systems at once, which are supposed to replace each other in an emergency.
The plane, which had taken off from Berlin, had to turn back shortly after takeoff. Merkel and Scholz transferred to a Spanish airliner – and arrived a day late at the summit of the most important economic powers. The mishap caused a lot of ridicule, but also led to the Bundestag raising around 1.2 billion euros for new aircraft. The result is the three new A350s, including the Konrad Adenauer.
Source of the news: https://www.n-tv.de/politik/
