War Department Secretary Pete Hegseth suffered a rare scare on Wednesday afternoon, when his plane was forced to make an “unscheduled landing” due to a crack in the windshield.
The secretary’s plane landed in the United Kingdom.
Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell revealed the news in a statement on social media, noting that Hegseth’s “plane made an unscheduled landing in the United Kingdom due to a crack in the aircraft windshield.”
Thankfully, Hegseth and all passengers on board were unharmed in the incident, as the secretary indicated.
“All good. Thank God,” he said on X. “Continue mission!”
The incident comes weeks after President Donald Trump suffered a similar fate.
As Fox News reported, the president and First Lady Melania Trump had to exit Marine One and enter a support helicopter over a hydraulic issue.
Hegseth’s plane was reportedly returning to the U.S. from Brussels before it was forced to land in the U.K. over a windshield crack.
Flight radars show the plane traveling through the Atlantic Ocean before turning back into the U.K.
The aircraft is a Boeing C-32A, which is the military version of the commercial Boeing 757-200, according to the Air Force.
Hegseth’s presence in Brussels was important, since the secretary was there to discuss the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war.
Hegseth reportedly traveled to the country to meet with NATO leaders and pressure them to ramp up military aid to Ukraine.
The secretary also issued a stern warning to the Kremlin over its continued aggression in Ukraine.
“If we must take this step, the U.S. War Department stands ready to do our part in ways that only the United States can do,” he said. “Now is the time to end this tragic war, stop the needless bloodshed, and come to the peace table.”
He pointed out that although the European war did not start under the Trump administration, it surely will end because of it.
Considering that Hegseth’s plane is an advanced government aircraft, social media users stressed the need for accountability and inquired into the latest incident.
“How does this happen? Are these planes not serviced? Seems suss to me,” one user said.
“This never happened before DEI hiring,” another wrote.
Hegseth is the latest high-profile official in the Trump administration to experience an issue on board a government aircraft.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio was also subjected to a similar incident while traveling to Munich, Germany, to attend the Munich Security Conference.
Rubio’s plane was said to have experienced a “mechanical issue” en route to the European nation. As a result, the aircraft made its way back to Joint Base Andrews in Virginia, where the secretary boarded a smaller plane and headed to Germany.
