Fury flies over plane’s photo op in New York

One of the president’s official planes and a supersonic fighter jet buzzed over Lower Manhattan just as the workday was beginning Monday. Within minutes, startled financial workers streamed out of their offices, fearing a nightmarish replay of Sept. 11.

For half an hour, the Boeing 747 and F-16 jet circled the Statue of Liberty and the Lower Manhattan skyline near the World Trade Center site. Offices evacuated. Dispatchers were inundated with calls. Witnesses thought the planes were flying dangerously low.

But the flyover was nothing but a photo op, apparently one of a series of flights to get pictures of the president’s airliner in front of national landmarks.

It was carried out by the Defense Department with little warning, infuriating New York officials and putting the White House on the defensive. Even Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg didn’t know about it, and he later called it “insensitive” to fly so near the site of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

“We thought we were under attack again,” said Laorie Crystal, 50, who saw the jet and its fighter plane as she was walking her Chihuahua.

“It was very scary,” she added. “They should have told the public, especially people down here who lived through the entire 9/11 situation.”

The director of the White House Military Office, Louis Caldera, took the blame and apologized. The airliner was a 747 that is called Air Force One when used by the president.

President Obama was furious, a White House official said on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

An administration official said the purpose of the photo op was to update file photos of the president’s plane near Lady Liberty.

“Why the Defense Department wanted to do a photo op right around the site of the World Trade Center catastrophe defies the imagination,” Bloomberg said. “Poor judgment would be a nice way to phrase it. . . . Had I known about it, I would have called them right away and asked them not to.”