Personally, I think it would have been a nicer touch to have let them take off. Then recall the plane to DC, just as it was about to leave US air space.
Or let it get there and recall the plane before the trip home.
“Personally, I think it would have been a nicer touch to have let them take off. Then recall the plane to DC, just as it was about to leave US air space.”
And even funnier if they made the international plane fly a holding pattern around the airport until the fuel ran out because of “ground problems”