Joke

Talk about making an entrance. The airplane carrying Kentucky Gov. Ernie Fletcher to Washington on Wednesday for Ronald Reagan's funeral was nearing Reagan National Airport when its transponder, which emits an electronic identification signal, began to malfunction.

This failure led air traffic controllers to report an unauthorized plane in the airspace over Washington. A panicky evacuation of the U.S. Capitol and Supreme Court quickly followed, and Fletcher's plane received a swift greeting from fighter jets.

Daniel Groves, the chief of staff, blamed events on miscommunication between airport officials and the Air Force. "They had been cleared to land," Groves said.

The public embarrassment of the evacuation, not to mention that the plane the governor of Kentucky travels in is a 33-year-old prop-driven craft, could spark the state to upgrade its aircraft.