Executive One Foxtrot: What The Call Sign Means & Whether Air Force One Would Use It

Call signs are of vital importance to aviators. They're used to identify specific pilots, with the Department of Defense noting, "If you've been a fully trained military pilot for more than a few months, chances are that you've scored yourself a call sign by now." Call signs are also used to identify those pilots' vital partners: their aircraft. 

Call signs ease friendly communications (with air traffic control, for instance) while serving as something of a code, helping defend against unfriendly interlopers on those communications. When a passenger as precious as the president is aboard, some very special call signs come into play. Air Force One is the legendary call sign given to any aircraft of the U.S. Air Force while the president is flying in it, but with a civilian plane, the sign is the lesser-known Executive One. This becomes Air Force Two and Executive Two, respectively, when the vice president is the passenger.

Executive One Foxtrot is a different call sign, and it involves travel by the president's family. Let's see exactly how it's used, how it differs from the iconic Air Force One, and whether Air Force One — the aircraft — would use the call sign. (U.S. presidents have also traveled in some rather stylish Ford cars, but we're focusing on aircraft today.) 

The Federal Aviation Administration's regulations for aircraft identification state: "When a member of the President's family is aboard any aircraft, if the U.S. Secret Service or the White House Staff determines it is necessary, state the words 'Executive One Foxtrot.'" For aircraft carrying the vice president's family, but not the vice president, the same is true, but the call sign would be Executive Two Foxtrot. 

The call sign Executive One would take precedence over Executive One Foxtrot — that is, if the president is traveling along with their family, the associated call sign would be Executive One. It's only if a family member is traveling without the commander in chief that the latter call sign would be used.

Non-civilian aircraft can also be referred to as Executive One Foxtrot, as CNBC reported in January 2019. The outlet, reporting on a flight taken by First Lady Melania Trump to Florida — without her husband, who was then serving his first term in office -– aboard a Boeing C32-A, noted: "The flight was officially designated EXEC1F, a call-sign known to be used when members of a president's family are aboard a military plane."

Every government has to always know where top officials are and what they're doing — for their safety and to ensure that any sudden, vital information can get exactly where it needs to be immediately. You wouldn't typically find the president on a commercial flight, though 37th president Richard Nixon did take a 1973 trip on United Airlines from Washington, D.C. to Los Angeles, a rare airing for the Executive One call sign.

Air Force One, of course, isn't only a call sign. It's also the name of a star-studded Wolfgang Petersen movie starring Harrison Ford as the president, for one. For many of us, though, these words bring to mind a specific aircraft: the legendary VC-25, one of the Air Force's most famous vehicles. These are Boeing 747-200Bs — just two of them — boasting a stateroom, refueling capacity, advanced technology for emergencies, and an office to serve as the president's official transport. These aircraft (and their upcoming successor, the VC-25B) require unique call signs.

Air Force One the call sign, as well as the aircraft deemed "Air Force One," are part of a long-standing U.S. presidential tradition. Other nations have their equivalents, with Russia's "Air Force One" (pictured here) — an Ilyushin Il-96-300PU known as "Plane No. 1" when the Russian president is aboard — another example. It, too, has to be protected, identified, and equipped with everything it needs to serve as a Kremlin in the sky in case of international emergencies.