The plane colloquially known as Air Force One does nothing if not command awe and attention. It is the ultimate symbol of the American president’s power and status. It is the most secure, expensive and technologically advanced passenger aircraft in the world, and dwarfs that of almost any other world leader. Painted white and robin’s egg blue with “United States of America” emblazoned on its fuselage, it is the first thing host nations see on their screens when the US president arrives to visit. It has become “part of our national mythology,” says Kenneth Walsh, author of its history.

Small wonder, then, that President Trump is upset. The new Air Force One that he ordered early in his first term – actually the two new Air Force Ones he ordered, because there is always a back-up – were supposed to have been delivered by now. Instead they are very unlikely to be delivered before the end of this, his second term of office.

This matters to Trump. An aviation enthusiast who once ran the hourly Trump Shuttle service between New York, Boston and Washington DC, he personally negotiated the contract for the pair of highly customised Boeing 747-8s in 2018. He designed the new planes’ red, white and blue livery. During the four-year hiatus between his two terms he kept a model of the new Air Force One on the desk in his office in Mar-a-Lago, and cut a cake topped by another model of the plane at one of his inauguration balls in January.