Another mishap occurred with a German government plane after a ground vehicle at Dortmund airport damaged the Bombardier Global 5000 machine German Chancellor Angela Merkel had used to fly to the western German city.
The parked plane was hit by a Renault Trafic transporter when the female driver saw the VIP plane and jumped out of the Renault to make a picture with her smartphone.
She forgot to apply the handbrake.
Flughafen Dortmund: Transporter rammt Flieger der Kanzlerin https://t.co/LBUB2ui0tq pic.twitter.com/q22bvnWbog
— DER SPIEGEL (@derspiegel) May 13, 2019
The plane was subsequently damaged on the fuselage. The extent of the damage was initially unknown.
After the impact, the German Chancellor was bought quickly out of the plane
The flight at 15:45 with Chancellor Angela Merkel to Berlin Tegel “Otto Lilienthal” International Airport (TXL/DEDDT) was cancelled.
She arrived with a Bundespolizei AS 332L1 Super Puma and left at 17:20 with a German Air Force AS 532UC Cougar instead to Berlin.
The incident is the most recent in a series of problems affecting the German government’s ageing fleet of 14 planes that carry ministers and the president, which has encountered numerous problems in the past months.
In December, Chancellor Angela Merkel arrived late to the G-20 summit in Buenos Aires after her plane had mechanical problems over the Netherlands and was forced to land in the western German city of Cologne.
See Details of Event: Luftwaffe Airbus A340-313 Carrying Angela Merkel To G20 summit Performs Emergency Landing
