Florida state jet N943FL, a Cessna Citation Latitude, flies Orlando to West Palm Beach in 36 minutes
Why It MattersPublic flight tracking of state-owned business jets makes government aircraft use visible in near real time, keeping utilisation of publicly financed fleets open to outside scrutiny.
A Cessna Citation Latitude registered N943FL, the FDLE aircraft associated with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, flew from Orlando to West Palm Beach in 36 minutes. It departed at 22:26 UTC and landed at 23:01 UTC over a great-circle distance of 124 nautical miles (143 miles). The aircraft climbed to 19,000 feet, reached a top ground speed of 419 knots and averaged 207 knots. Celebplanes estimates the flight burned about 137 US gallons of fuel and produced roughly 1,320 kilograms of CO2.
Before the flight, N943FL had been on the ground at Orlando for about two hours. In the 30 days before the flight, the jet had made one other landing at West Palm Beach, on October 6. Its home base is Tallahassee International Airport (KTLH), and its most common destinations over the past month were Tallahassee (17 landings), Pensacola (5) and Pinellas Park (4). In that 30-day period it visited 22 airports and flew about 9,339 nautical miles; the longest leg was Delray Beach to Philadelphia on October 6, covering 836 nautical miles.
The Citation Latitude is a super midsize jet with a range of 2,700 nautical miles and a ceiling of 45,000 feet. It seats up to nine passengers (typically eight), is powered by Safran Arrius 2B2 turbofans and has a maximum takeoff weight of 30,800 pounds. The FDLE aircraft was purchased in 2019 for $15.5 million and costs Florida taxpayers about $1.2 million per year in financing. It drew scrutiny during the 2024 campaign when flight tracking showed it visiting early primary states at the same time as DeSantis campaign events, prompting ethics complaints and questions about separating state business from political activity.
DeSantis was inaugurated as the 46th Governor of Florida on January 8, 2019, and was re-elected in 2022 by a 19-point margin. He launched and withdrew from the 2024 Republican presidential primary before endorsing Donald Trump. The arrival airport is named for Trump, who keeps a residence at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, about three miles away. Trump was scheduled to hold a fundraiser in Palm Beach on the evening of October 20.
