Flightradar 24 announced Tuesday that the plane it believes is carrying U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan was the most followed live flight on its service.
The Boeing C-40 C, with the call sign SPAR 19, had more than 700,000 people following its movements prior to landing.
708,000 people were tracking SPAR 19 at the peak. Ian Petchenik, Flightradar 24 s director of communications, told FOX Business that it set a new record for live tracking.
SPAR 19 was already the most tracked flight on Flightradar 24 among active flights, according to the website's blog post, which was lifted from Kuala Lumpur at 15: 42 local time.
Petchenik told FOX Business that Flightradar 24's previous most-tracked flight was when Putin critic Alexei Navalny was returning home to Russia after surviving a suspected poisoning attempt. The flight had 550,000 users following its peak.
Pelosi, who is conducting a tour of multiple allied nations in Asia, touched down at around 10: 45 a.m. EST in Taiwan despite threats to the speaker's safety and strong opposition from China.
Our visit is one of several congressional delegations to Taiwan, and it doesn't contradict longstanding United States policy, guided by the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979, U.S.-China Joint Communiques and the Six Assurances, Pelosi said after arrival. The United States is opposed to unilateral efforts to change the status quo. Pelosi is the first House speaker to visit Taiwan since Newt Gingrich in 1997, and the Taiwanese government is eager to host the speaker. Diplomatic trips of this level could give Taiwan legitimacy on the world stage.
China has warned against such a visit in the past few weeks, including threats from government officials and TV personalities.