King Salman, stuck on his golden escalator. Screenshot/Twitter via @annalecta

As leader of Saudi Arabia, King Salman travels in rarefied air. On Wednesday, he found himself stuck in it.

As the Saudi king arrived in Moscow, the golden escalator he uses to disembark his plane malfunctioned, leaving him stuck halfway to the tarmac.

Salman and his retinue looked on in confusion for several moments, before the 81-year-old king began to descend the staircase step by step.

The Saudi king is in Russia to discuss the global oil market and Syrian crisis with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Luckily for the Saudi leader those meetings appear to be moving better than his escalator, as he and Putin agreed on Thursday to a deal for Russia's advanced S-400 missile defense system.

You can watch the scene below: