Merkel will miss G20 summit opening after her plane is forced to land after serious malfunction

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will miss the opening of the G20 summit in Argentina after her plane was forced to land shortly after leaving Berlin.

According to BBC, her office says Mrs Merkel and delegates made a safe, but unscheduled, landing in Cologne after the aircraft developed a technical problem. The plane turned back while it was over the Netherlands, Germany’s dpa news agency says.

DW reports “It was a serious malfunction,” Merkel told reporters early Friday morning, complimenting a “very, very excellent crew” on board the plane.

Shortly after departing from Berlin on Thursday evening, the plane circled over the Netherlands and landed at the Cologne/Bonn airport in western Germany — which is also home base for the German government’s aircraft.

Merkel, who is also traveling with Finance Minister Olaf Scholz and a pool of journalists, will now stay overnight in Bonn, the former West German capital where the Chancellery still maintains a largely ceremonial presence, before traveling Friday with a small delegation to Madrid then on to Buenos Aires, according to government spokesman Steffen Seibert.

The pilot informed the chancellor and other passengers that a technical defect had caused the “malfunction of several electronic systems” on the Airbus A340-300.

According to multiple German media outlets, the aircraft experienced problems with its radio equipment, but the pilot said there had been no safety risks. German news magazine Der Spiegel reported the crew had to use an onboard satellite phone in order to plan the landing.

Issues with the government’s A340 jets also caused travel problems for German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier during several of his diplomatic trips this year.

Last week, Steinmeier was delayed during a trip to several African countries when the government’s “Theodor Heuss” jet — also an Airbus A340 — experienced problems. His trip to Belarus in July was likewise temporarily grounded when the “Konrad Adenauer” suffered issues with its hydraulic system.

Asked about the recent difficulties with government planes, Merkel said the “individual incidents should not make us change the system.”