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Moving the president of the United States from one location to another is a logistical
nightmare that happens every single day.
The American president is one of the most powerful persons in the world and there is
no time when the president is more exposed than when they’re in transport.
Two of the four successful assassinations of American presidents were when they were
traveling—Garfield and Kennedy.
For that reason, the secret service devotes an enormous amount of resources to ensuring
the president gets from one place to another safely.
The presidential motorcade is perhaps the most impressive method of transportation.
It includes up to 40 or 50 vehicles and over 100 people.
Let’s take a look at some footage of a motorcade.
This is the lead car, or in this case, motorcycle.
As the name suggests, it’s job is to lead the motorcade, but it’s not actually the
first vehicle.
What we don’t see here is the route car which would’ve come through about five minutes
before the lead car.
The route car is always followed by about 20-30 motorcycles which play the essential
role of clearing the route of cars.
When driving on a highway, they’ll speed ahead and close exits so that no cars can
come on the highway, although they have to use a different technique in cities.
When driving in DC, where other drivers are used to frequent motorcades, the motorcycles
often drive in a “V” pattern pushing cars to the side to clear the way for the motorcade.
This leads to a disruption of only two or three minutes.
Outside of DC, drivers are less used to motorcades so the motorcycles will typically completely
block off the intersecting streets to create one continuous clear path for the president.
The entire first section of the motorcade isn’t actually run by the secret service—its
run by the local police jurisdiction of wherever the president is.
The fewer secret service cars and individuals needed for motorcades the better since both
the cars and agents need to travel to wherever the president is visiting in advance which
is, of course, incredibly expensive.
The next part of the motorcade is what’s known as the secure package.
It’s the essential core to the motorcade because its the group of cars that directly
secures the president.
In case of attack, this group of cars can detach from the rest of the motorcade and
function as an independent unit.
The most important car in the secure package is the president’s limo but one can never
be sure which one that is because there are always two limos.
These two limos are identical—they even have the same license plate.
That way an attacker can’t, for example, have a spotter tell them which car the president
left their origin in.
The limos themselves are no ordinary limos.
They weigh between 15,000 and 20,000 pounds and are built on a modified truck bed.
The entire car is bulletproof including 5 inch thick bulletproof windows.
The only window that can open is the drivers window, reportedly so they can pay tolls.
The entire car is hermetically sealed to protect the president from a chemical attack and onboard
are rocket powered grenades, night vision optics, a tear gas cannon, pump-action shotguns,
bottled oxygen, and two pints of the president’s blood type.
This car, leading the secure package, is the United States Secret Service Electronic Countermeasures
Suburban.
It leads the secure package because its purpose is to jam any remote activated explosives
along the route.
These two tall antennas do that by sending out a huge range of radio frequencies that
would block any bomb activation signal.
The two domes on top of the car are most likely what’s known as electronic warfare sensors.
They’re essentially radars that can detect when a rocket propelled grenade or anti-tank
guided missile is launched.
When it detects a launch, the car would most likely activate a number of smoke grenades
spread out throughout the secure package which would help throw off the grenade or missile,
but of course this is all classified so that’s speculation.
This car is the control car.
It carries the most essential staff like the president’s military aide and doctor.
In the event of an attack, they’re both essential to the president so they break off
with the secure package.
These last two cars are both filled with secret service agents.
The closer one is called the halfback.
It carries the president’s personal secret service detail.
These are the agents that are on the president’s person at all times.
The second one is the CAT car—the Counter-Assault Team.
You can always identify these cars since they’re the ones with the back window open.
That’s because the agents are sitting in rear-facing seats with automatic weapons,
ready to respond to threats.
While its hard to see, you can just make out the counter-assault team in this car in black
battle dress uniforms and the president’s secret service detail in this car in coat
and tie.
In the event of an attack, the president’s secret service detail is in charge of shielding
and evacuating the president while the counter-assault team would generally stay and repel the attack.
These vans following the secure package are full of the press pool reporting on the president.
This car is called the ID car and the secret service agents inside are the ones that communicate
with outside counter-surveillance teams that proactively identify any threat to the motorcade.
This black truck is the Hazardous Materials Mitigation Unit.
It has equipment and personnel who can identify and respond to chemical, nuclear, or biological
attacks on the motorcade.
Continuing on, you can see more press vans.
These motorcycles are speeding by the side because, now that the motorcade has passed
the exit that they were blocking off, they are going to the front of the motorcade to
block off more exits.
This car is called the roadrunner.
It has a number of antennas on top to act as a mobile communications center.
It connects the motorcade to the outside world through satellite and internet communications
systems.
Following this is a generic ambulance in case of injury to any person in the motorcade.
Like the police officers at the front of the motorcade, this ambulance just comes from
the local fire department of wherever the president is.
This last secret service car is the support car which carries more secret service agents
and essential staff members.
Lastly, these three police cars are there to make sure that, now that the exits are
open again, no car speeds up and enters the motorcade from behind.
It’s important to note that this is just the standard motorcade configuration.
It often changes based on the environment.
When President Obama visited Iraq in 2009, for example, his motorcade looked like this.
Military humvees led a convoy of identical suburbans—one of which carried the president.
On top of the cars were more powerful versions of the anti-RPG antennas found on the normal
Electronic Countermeasures Suburban.
So, motorcades are incredibly efficient.
It’s been reported that motorcades have made the trip between Laguardia airport and
the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in Manhattan in 8-10 minutes.
That’s a 10 mile drive that takes a normal driver 25-30 minutes.
Although, the safest motorcade is still no motorcade since its the most exposed the president
ever is so the secret service will typically only use motorcades for trips up to 30 minutes
long.
Motorcades are also incredibly logistically difficult and expensive, so whenever possible,
the president will travel on Marine One.
Marine one isn’t actually the name of a specific helicopter, it’s rather the callsign
used by any helicopter with the president onboard.
The Marine Corps operates 35 total helicopters of a few different types as Marine One’s
which might seem like overkill, but these helicopters are often also used to transport
the Vice President—when they’re known as Marine Two—or government VIP’s.
While Marine One is occasionally used to transport the president from point to point, its most
frequent mission is to bring the president from the White House to Andrews Air Force
Base.
The presidents planes are based at Andrews Air Force Base so this 12 mile trip is how
the president starts and finishes any long-distance trip.
Much like the president’s limo, Marine One never flies alone.
Right after take off, its met by as many as five other identical helicopters which shuffle
positions in flight to throw off potential attackers.
Air Force One is also not a particular aircraft but rather the callsign used whenever the
president is aboard an Air Force aircraft.
Typically, the role is served by one of two modified Boeing 747’s.
To give you a sense of how efficient this entire transport system is, let’s time a
trip from the White house to UN Headquarters in New York.
The 12 mile flight to Andrews Air Force Base takes about 8 minutes on Marine One, then,
upon arrival, the president steps onboard Air Force One.
The president is always the last person to step on Air Force One, so the second he’s
there the door closes and the aircraft taxies for takeoff.
That means there’s about 5 minutes between touchdown of Marine One and take off of Air
Force One.
From there it’s about a 30 minute flight to JFK airport in New York followed by a 7
minute trip on Marine One to Downtown Manhattan Heliport, then a 6 minute motorcade up FDR
Drive to the United Nations.
That means that, if everything goes perfectly, including transfer times, it will take almost
exactly one hour for the president to go from stepping out of the White House to stepping
inside the United Nations.
And what is the cost of this hour long trip?
Well its public information that Air Force One costs an estimated $206,337 per flight
hour, so this half hour flight costs $103,169, but of course we need to include Marine One.
Marine One by itself is actually fairly inexpensive to operate.
While we don’t know its exact operating cost, one of the helicopters often used as
Marine One is the Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk which costs $2,199 per flight hour.
But of course Marine One always flies in formation with up to 5 other helicopters.
Per helicopter, a quarter hour of flight time costs $530 or $3,180 total.
The motorcade’s cost for the short trip is fairly minuscule, so we’ll leave it out
for simplicity.
But the helicopters and cars need to get to New York, and this is done by loading them
up on a C-5 Galaxy cargo plane which costs $100,941 per flight hour or $50,471 for the
half hour trip to New York.
Altogether, that’s $156,820 for the hour long trip to New York or $2,614 per minute,
and keep in mind the president needs to travel back too.
Ultimately, transportation of the President costs the American taxpayer about $350,000,000
per year—roughly 1/4 of the $1.4 billion yearly white house budget.
This is certainly a steep price, but many would argue that its a small price to pay
to keep the most powerful person in the world safe.
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