Plane awkward: How Brigitte and Emmanuel Macron joined the club

Published connected 27/05/2025 - 17:29 GMT+2•Updated 17:30

French President Emmanuel Macron's caller awkwardness with his woman Brigitte, caught connected movie arsenic nan mates prepared to disembark connected presence for an charismatic circuit of Vietnam, is nary wholly caller phenomenon.

Embarkation arsenic good arsenic disembarkation person some seen world leaders embroiled successful moments that person been captured connected movie for posterity, sparking irony and satire, and capturing their embarrassment for posterity. Here are immoderate of nan astir noted examples:

Gerald Ford's fall

US President Gerald Ford slipped and fell successful June 1975 while descending nan steps of Air Force One successful Salzburg, Austria. The incident was captured connected camera and abruptly became nan taxable of satire.

Ford blamed nan gaffe connected an aged knee injury, but this section gave him nan estimation of a bumbler, which was utilized by apical comedian Chevy Chase forhis sketches.

The incident became an rumor for Ford's re-election run nan pursuing year, contributing to a cognition of clumsiness during his presidency. Ford mislaid nan predetermination to Jimmy Carter.

Biden's analyzable narration pinch nan stairs

Another US President to find nan stairs tricky was Joe Biden, who knowledgeable aggregate stumbles while boarding Air Force One.

In March 2021, he tripped three times ascending nan stairs astatine Joint Base Andrews, which nan White House attributed to windy conditions. Biden appeared to return a infinitesimal to particulate disconnected his knee earlier making his measurement onto nan aircraft.

A similar incident occurred successful 2023, sparking doubts astir his beingness condition.

Trump's issues pinch planes

Despite avoiding awesome incidents, Donald Trump has sometimes struggled successful climbing and descending stairs arsenic well.

In October 2018, he was seen discarding an umbrella astatine nan apical of nan Air Force One stairs, letting it rotation distant arsenic he boarded nan plane.

On different occasion, he was spotted with a portion of toilet insubstantial stuck to nan sole of his shoe, arsenic he boarded an Air Force One level heading to Minnesota.

In June 2020, he was observed cautiously descending a ramp astatine West Point, sparking discussions astir his health. He later explained that nan ramp was "very agelong and steep" and lacked a handrail .

A First Lady falling

In November 2022, nan past Indonesian First Lady Iriana stumbled while descending nan stairs of nan statesmanlike aircraft, connected her hubby Joko Widodo's arm.

The statesmanlike mates landed astatine nan I Gusti Ngurah Rai Airport successful Bali, to subordinate nan G20 summit.

Iriana was instantly assisted by nan statesmanlike information squad and, unharmed, was capable to spell connected pinch her scheduled engagements.

Boris Yeltsin's no-show

Sometimes conscionable uncovering nan stairs tin beryllium excessively overmuch of a challenge. This was nan lawsuit of Russian president Boris Yeltsin, who landed successful Ireland successful 1994 for an charismatic sojourn but did not look from his aeroplane.

Then Irish Taoiseach Albert Reynolds and his ministers were near bemused  on nan reddish carpet astatine Shannon Airport, waiting successful vain for nan Russian premier.

Various excuses were offered for his absence: he was "indisposed", resting aft a tiring flight, his bodyguards excessively frightened to aftermath him. Most sentiment coalesced astir nan proposal that he was simply excessively drunk to make it to nan stairs, however.

Yeltsin wrote to Reynolds apologising for nan "unfortunate mishap" that prevented their gathering and extending an invitation to Reynolds to sojourn Russia nan pursuing year.