Related to this article: Caught in the Net: Tunisia’s First Lady For additional Web extras from the January/February 2008 issue of FP, click here.

Heads of state have always liked to travel in style. Former Zairian President Mobuto Sese Seko, for instance, leased himself a supersonic Concorde to get around in the late 1980s and early 1990s. President George W. Bush flies around the world in two Boeing 747s. And Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah travels in a notoriously plush jumbo jet.

But how did a group of enterprising Tunisian bloggers find out just where their president’s plane was flying—and when? A few online tools make it simple. Web sites run by plane-spotting hobbyists, such as Airliners.net, allow users to search for photos of aircrafts, accompanied by the date and the location where the photo was taken.

Some simple information can be helpful when tracking a president’s plane, including the type of aircraft, who operates it, the plane’s tail number, and its “CN” or construction number, essentially a serial number unique to each aircraft. To get you started, FP has compiled this information for the airplanes of 20 heads of state, listed below, along with links to photos of the leaders’ high-flying homes.

Michelle Bachelet
President of Chile
Type of plane: Boeing 737
Operated by: Chilean Air Force
Tail number: 921
CN: 28866/2929
View the plane

Hu Jintao
President of the People’s Republic of China
Type of plane: Boeing 747
Operated by: Air China
Tail number: B-2472
CN: 30158/1243
View the plane

Álvaro Uribe
President of Colombia
Type of plane: Boeing 737
Operated by: Colombian Air Force
Tail number: FAC-0001
CN: 29272/323
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Manmohan Singh
Prime Minister of India
Type of Plane: Boeing 747
Operated by: Air India
Tail number: VT-EGC
CN: 21995/434
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Jalal Talabani
President of Iraq
Type of plane: Boeing 767
Operated by: Iraqi Airways
Tail number: J2-KCN
CN: 22526/92
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Yasuo Fukuda
Prime Minister of Japan
Type of plane: Two Boeing 747s
Operated by: Japan Air Self Defense Force
Tail number: 20-1101, 20-1102
CN: 816/24730
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Abdullah II
King of Jordan
Type of plane: Airbus A340-211
Operated by: The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan
Tail number: JY-ABH
CN: 009
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Nursultan Nazarbayev
President of Kazakhstan
Type of Plane: Boeing 767
Operated by: Kazakh Government
Tail number: UN-B6701
CN: 32954/861
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Filipe Calderón
President of Mexico
Type of plane: Boeing 757
Operated by: Mexican Air Force
Tail number: XC-UJM
CN: 22690/151
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Vladimir Voronin
President of Moldova
Type of plane: Yakovlev Yak-40
Operated by: Air Moldova
Tail number: ER-YGD
CN: 9831458
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Qaboos bin Said
Sultan of Oman
Type of Plane: Boeing 747
Operated by: Oman Royal Flight
Tail number: A40-SO
CN: 21785/405
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Pervez Musharraf
President of Pakistan
Type of plane: Airbus A310-308
Operated by: Pakistan International Airlines
Tail number: AP-BEQ
CN: 656
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Vladimir Putin
President of Russia
Type of plane: Ilyusin II-96-300
Operated by: Russia State Transport Company
Tail number: RA-96012
CN: 74393201009
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King Abdullah
King of Saudi Arabia
Type of plane: Boeing 747
Operated by: Saudi Arabia Royal Flight
Tail number: HZ-HM1A
CN: 23070/592
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Traian Basescu
President of Romania
Type of plane: Boeing 707
Operated by: Romanian Government
Tail number: YR-ABB
CN: 20804/883
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Thabo Mbeki
President of South Africa
Type of plane: Boeing 737
Operated by: South African Air Force
Tail number: ZS-RSA
CN: 32627/826
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Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali
President of Tunisia
Type of plane: Boeing 737
Operated by: Tunisian Air Force
Tail number: T8-100
CN: 29149/348
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Recep Tayyip Erdogan
Prime Minister of Turkey
Type of plane: Airbus A319-115X
Operated by: Turkish Government
Tail number: TC-ANA
CN: 1002
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George W. Bush
President of the United States
Type of plane: Two Boeing 747s
Operated by: U.S. Air Force
Tail numbers: 82-8000, 92-9000
CN: 23824/679
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Hugo Chávez
President of Venezuela
Type of plane: Airbus 319
Operated by: Venezuelan Air Force
Tail number: 0001
CN: 1468
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