I thought they always had two armed escorts.
Sometime in the mid/late ‘90s I was camping on the south rim of the Grand Canyon. Shortly after dark I heard and saw two large aircraft flying west-sw far faster than civilian aircraft fly and #2 was less than 1/4 mile directly behind #1. There were 2 fighter jets escorting them just off to either side of #2.
I puzzled on that for about a half a minute and concluded that it must be Bubba flying to LA.
No. Normally they do not. They are always under norad watch and they have jets along route they can scramble. But normally no armed escorts.
The C-17 was probably part of the presidential support mission. Back in the late ‘90s it was called Banner Express. When Air Force 1 lands at Andrews, or anywhere else for that matter, there is a 30 minute ramp freeze in effect. No planes in, no planes out. Not sure what that Globemaster was doing there. He should have been in a 30 minute holding pattern. Been there, done that, got the flight suit patch.