Kash Patel's Gulfstream G550 N708JH lands at Richmond after 24-minute hop from Joint Base Andrews

Kash Patel's Gulfstream G550, tail number N708JH, landed at Richmond International Airport (KRIC) on Tuesday, November 10, 2026, at 02:07 UTC. The aircraft departed Joint Base Andrews (KADW) in Camp Springs, Maryland, at 01:43 UTC. The flight took 24 minutes to cover the 83 nautical miles between the two airports.

The Gulfstream G550 is an ultra long range jet with a top speed of Mach 0.885 and a ceiling of 51,000 feet. On this flight, the aircraft reached a highest altitude of 9,850 feet and a top ground speed of 387 knots. The estimated fuel burn was about 172 US gallons, producing about 1,657 kilograms of CO2. The G550 has a range of 6,750 nautical miles and typically seats 16 passengers.

Richmond International Airport is a frequent destination for this aircraft. In the 30 days before this flight, the plane landed at Richmond 12 times, with the most recent landing on November 5, 2026. The aircraft's home base is Washington Manassas Harry P. Davis Field (KHEF), 74 nautical miles from Richmond. Other tracked aircraft that landed at Richmond in the 24 hours before this landing included a NextEra Energy Embraer Praetor 600 about 10 hours earlier and a Glenn Youngkin Beechcraft King Air 350 about 8 hours earlier.

Kash Patel was confirmed as the 9th Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation on February 20, 2025. As FBI Director, Patel is required by federal policy to use the DOJ's Gulfstream G550 for security reasons for both official and personal travel. The aircraft has attracted public scrutiny after tracking showed it used for flights to Las Vegas, Hawaii, and visits to his girlfriend's hometown. In 2025, members of Congress demanded Patel reimburse taxpayers and produce records of personal flights charged to the government.

Richmond is near the FBI's headquarters in Washington, D.C., and the aircraft frequently shuttles between the two locations. The short flight from Joint Base Andrews to Richmond is consistent with the pattern of the aircraft returning to its home base area after other trips. The aircraft's previous tracked flight before this one landed at Joint Base Andrews on November 10, 2026, about one hour before departing for Richmond.

The aircraft used only 1 percent of its total range on this 83-nautical-mile trip. The average ground speed was 207 knots. The plane departed from Joint Base Andrews, which has a longest runway of 11,301 feet at an elevation of 280 feet. It landed at Richmond International Airport, where the longest runway is 9,003 feet at 167 feet elevation.

In the 30 days before this flight, the aircraft made 35 flights totaling 51.9 hours in the air. Those flights produced an estimated 214,355 kilograms of CO2. The longest leg in that period was from Richmond to San Diego on October 28, 2026, covering 1,965 nautical miles. The plane visited 21 airports in one country during that time.

The Gulfstream G550 remains one of several Gulfstream jets in the federal government's fleet used for senior official transport. The aircraft is owned by the U.S. Department of Justice and registered to an address at 935 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, the FBI headquarters.