So, uh, tell me again why our governor took the state jet to Greensboro, a city an hour’s drive from Raleigh even without a highway patrol escort? Does she have a clue about how much jet fuel costs nowadays? Is this good stewardship of our tax dollars?
Gov. Perdue’s plane made a safe emergency landing at Raleigh-Durham International airport this afternoon after a plane malfunction, her spokeswoman said Friday. No one was injured.Her plane was on the way to make to make a job expansion announcement when her plane exhibited unusual vibrations in connection with the retraction of the landing gear, and a decision was made to return to RDU, according to Chris Mackey, her press secretary.
via Perdue makes emergency landing at RDU | newsobserver.com projects.
Update: Here’s a state auditor report on the state aircraft operations, undertaken by then-state auditor Ralph Campbell, Jr. in 2005.
Update 2: My friend Warren has pointed out that Greensboro is closer to a 90 minute drive from Raleigh. Guess I’ll cut our governor some slack after all.
hey man, I don’t geek out on reading Gov’t docs. Can you give us the lowdown on what that said?
ftr, Mark – if you can make it from Raleigh to Greensboro in an hour … you’re doing something “special” 🙂
True, Warren. It’s 90 minutes. Perhaps a flight isn’t as bad as I first thought.
@Warren, I live downtown Raleigh and can make Downtown G’boro in 1 hour 15 minutes. I think Mark is pretty spot on with regard to this
@scootdawg – maybe it’s changed since I lived there, but time from my apartment (next to the 54/55 interchange) to downtown Raleigh (The Flying Saucer or Tir Na Nog) was 20-25 minutes.
From there to the Elon exit was 45-50 minutes. Excluding the 2-3 minutes to get on the interstate, that at least 65 minutes to the Elon exit (140) from downtown (a randomly chosen point, of course). Getting all the way into Greensboro for me was always another 15-20 minutes from the Elon exit on I40 .. maybe I just drive a little closer to 65, but getting from downtown to downtown in 75 minutes seems a little aggressive to me 🙂
@warren to be fair, I live downtown right off Wade so I have a straight shot to 40. I don’t have to mess around with interchanges and round about ways to get there. That is definitely an advantage
@scootdawg – fair enough .. direct on 40 the whole way would be faster 🙂