Illinois Senator and presumptive democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama waves at members of... 
(ABC News Photo Illustration)
More Photos
As tension mounted and the pilot rapidly descended from 32,000 feet, he was asked how many were on the jet.
"51 souls on board," he responded.
Then, at 10,000 feet, the pilot suddenly regained control.
"Ah, sir, we had a pitch authority problem. Now that we've come down to a lower altitude, it seems to have rectified itself. We do have pitch control of the aircraft at this time," the unnamed Midwest pilot reported to the St. Louis control tower.
As the jet landed safely in St. Louis, Sen. Obama called his wife and, apparently unaware of the drama in the cockpit, tried to laugh it off.
"Just thought we'd spice things up a little bit today," he told reporters.
Asked if he was afraid, Obama said, "Anytime a pilot says, you know, that something's not working the way it's supposed to, then you know, you make sure you tighten your seat belt."
The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the incident. In a preliminary report, the NTSB said it detected "marks consistent with rubbing of elevator control cables" and a broken railing that "impinged upon elevator control cables."
A spokesperson for Midwest said the company would not comment on the incident while the NTSB investigation is underway.
The Obama campaign had chartered the MD-81 from Midwest while its current campaign plane, a Boeing 757 chartered from North American Airlines, was being reconfigured. It was put into use on July 20.
The McCain campaign also debuted a new plane last month, a Boeing 737-400, chartered from Team Jet. A spokesperson, Brian Rogers, said he was unaware if the incident with the Obama plane had led to any safety evaluations of Senator McCain's campaign plane.
Eric Longabardi is a freelance journalist based in Los Angeles who is a frequent contributor to the Blotter on ABCNews.com.
Click Here for the Investigative Homepage.
Do you have more information about this topic? If so, please click here to contact the editors of ABC News.
