Earlier that week, we had a lot of rain. The ground was just starting to get dried up in some places around town. After Clinton's visit, Air Force 1 was going to take off when it got stuck in the mud at Willard Airport when the landing gear run off the approach to the main runway. Here's a picture I got from a friend. I don't know the source, though...

That's right - the pilot screwed up. Although the runways were 18 feet narrower than what the pilots were used to, you'd think they would be a bit more professional (or careful) when the President of the United States is on board. How would you explain this to the President?

"Uh, Sir, we are stuck in the mud..."

Apparently they were turning onto the main runway and understeered, partly because they didn't realize the runways were narrow, causing the landing gear on the right side to go off the runway. By the time they noticed this, the plane was stuck in the mud.

Naturally, all air service to Champaign-Urbana was cancelled until the plane could be removed, which took about a day because they needed to wait for the ground to dry up. Another Air Force 1 plane had to come by and pick Clinton up. It was the same plane Lyndon Johnson flew in after Kennedy's assassination.

The story goes that Clinton wanted to fire the pilot, but couldn't for some reason - I forget why. Of course, the story was all over the world within hours. There was even a story in the local newspaper (and I mean **LOCAL**) in the small village of Trieste, Italy. We were informed of this by a couple of Wolfram employees (one whom I worked with) who were forced to go back home to Italy temporarily while their visa passes were being cleared up.

We saw the pilots checking into the Radisson hotel, which is next door to our building. Talk about embarassing for any pilot. I'd hate to be that guy...