President Obama said this morning that a photo opportunity that panicked some New Yorkers when one of his official airplanes flew low over Manhattan was a mistake and would never happen again.
The incident on Monday, which lit up 911 emergency telephone lines in New York and New Jersey, drew criticism from top officials, including Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer, because it raised fears of a terrorist attack in Manhattan, where the World Trade Center was destroyed on Sept. 11, 2001.
"It was a mistake," Obama told reporters this morning before he went to visit FBI headquarters. "It was something we found out about along with all of you and it will not happen again."
Obama was not aboard the plane during the incident.
One of the Boeing 747s used by the president, along with an F-16 jet, circled the Statue of Liberty in the early hours of Monday, startling commuters and residents on both sides of the Hudson River. The plane, which is called Air Force One when the president is aboard, flew as low as 1,000 feet, rattling windows in the Wall Street area and prompting some workers to flee office buildings.
The flight was authorized as a publicity photo shoot by the Defense Department. Louis Caldera, the director of the White House military office, apologized for the incident on Monday.
Caldera, 53, a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and also a lawyer, was secretary of the Army during the administration of former President Bill Clinton and previously was a state legislator in California.
michael.muskal@latimes.com
