Buried in the comments[1] is a jpg showing the sequence of multiple photos and one of the images has smoke from the tires <i>landing</i>:<p><a href="https://i.stack.imgur.com/QTrv2.jpg" rel="nofollow">https://i.stack.imgur.com/QTrv2.jpg</a><p>It's a fun mental exercise to know that the final answer is <i>landing</i> while reading the answers that forcefully argue that the plane is <i>taking off</i>. Some of the "evidence" to support that the plane is taking off is very persuasive.<p>[1] <a href="https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/34586/is-this-plane-landing-or-departing#comment194183_34609" rel="nofollow">https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/34586/is-this-p...</a>
I remember this showing up in the SO sidebar a long time ago (what a time-suck that thing is). At the time, I remember thinking that some of these people must be trolling - and I still do.<p>For example, the people arguing that the wheels have already touched down. It seems abundantly obvious to me that the wheels have NOT touched down, and that the small strip of black asphalt running parallel to the wheels is a taxi-way in the background which has lots of small aircraft sitting on it. I get the uneasy feeling that anybody that sees it any differently is just trying to gaslight me. But, then, that was also the feeling I got about the blue dress, and that turned out to be all too genuine... People genuinely saw it differently, they weren't trolling.<p>To me, the lack of heat blur behind the engines seems to be reasonably conclusive evidence that it's landing... But who knows.
Do you think it's possible that Air Force One Pilots are instructed to land at unconventional spots on the runway to foil potential threats? Perhaps even to land at different spots on the runway on different landings?<p>I know it sounds far-fetched, but my mom who was the "Cultural Affairs Officer" at the US Embassy in San Jose Costa Rica was instructed to take a different route from home to the embassy and back every day, and to try to depart at slightly different times each trip. This was in the late 80s when Costa Rica was a relatively safe place (it's even safer today).
My quick guess was landing for the simple reason that the plane would very quickly rotate through that particular attitude taking off, but would travel much further in that attitude on landing.
It just reminds me Blender meme.[0]<p>[0] <a href="https://twitter.com/mxeon1001/status/1108738701956472833" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/mxeon1001/status/1108738701956472833</a><p>[image] <a href="https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D2MH4hwWwAEjhsv?format=jpg&name=orig" rel="nofollow">https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D2MH4hwWwAEjhsv?format=jpg&name=...</a>
I don't understand why nobody asked OP the exact date and time this picture was taken, which they would certainly have if they are the original photographer.<p>With a date and time you can easily cross reference press schedules (released by the White House) or flight plan data (archived by FlightRadar24 among others) or Twitter posts or other published photographs or....etc. AF1 isn't exactly a stealth fighter; its location at least domestically is rather well tracked.
This answer: <a href="https://aviation.stackexchange.com/a/34627" rel="nofollow">https://aviation.stackexchange.com/a/34627</a> is most likely correct. Based on the fact that main carriage is off the ground, flap setting and wing AoA. During departure the rotation angle would be larger before main wheels leave the ground.
I think I see a wheel bogie (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bogie" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bogie</a>) that’s over 45 degrees from the horizontal.<p>Would that ever happen so soon after take off? I would think these stayed fairly horizontal until it’s known the plane won’t abort take off.
You'd have to research what planes look like departing and landing.<p>But without that.. I would have thought (as a layman) - is the plane doing anything to add vs cut drag? That could be a clue...<p>(from a toy perspective of how planes work in movies ofc).