FAA investigating park overflights after more complaints

JACKSON — The Federal Aviation Administration is again investigating complaints of overflights and low-level flights over Grand Teton National Park by Tony Chambers and his Wind River Air scenic helicopter tour company, following additional allegations reported to the federal agency.
An email from Derek Smith, principal operations inspector with the FAA, to the Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance dated Feb. 10 states, in part: “This letter is in response to your complaint on February 2, 2022, regarding the low flying helicopter near Grand Tetons [sic] National Park. The matter is being investigated by the office and appropriate action will be taken based on the findings of the investigation.”
Caroline Daley, public lands community organizer for the Conservation Alliance, said the complaint was based on information shared by Flat Creek Ranch owner Joe Albright to the Jackson Hole Airport Board. 
Albright has written two letters to the airport board — one in early December and the most recent in early March — that document 19 park overflights and/or low-level flights by Chambers and Wind River Air. Airport Director Jim Elwood has told the News&Guide that the board passes any such complaints on to the FAA, and that once an aircraft leaves the airport, it is under the purview of the FAA, not the airport.
The March 3 letter alleged 11 newly discovered flights violated the terms of “a voluntary agreement with three federal agencies which declared that his helicopter ‘will not overfly Grand Teton National Park, or within a half mile outside the boundary of the Park, except for the purposes of takeoff and landing,’ ” Albright wrote, referring to a November 2020 Voluntary Commercial Air Tour Management Agreement for Public Lands in Teton County, Wyoming, which Chambers signed.
Based on records obtained through the Wyoming Public Records Act, Albright wrote that most or all of the 11 flights were paid scenic air tours, and not “positioning flights” or ferrying flights, as Chambers has said in the past and reiterated in a Tuesday interview.
Most egregious of those, according to Albright’s letter, was a scenic tour that “flew within half a mile of Oxbow Bend, one of the Park’s most iconic sites, at an altitude of 882 feet above the ground.”
In his December letter, Albright, whose dude ranch is in the Gros Ventre Range near helicopter flight paths, stated that Chambers on several occasions has flown at altitudes below “the FAA airspace advisory of 2,000 feet above ground level.” Such low-level flights, Albright wrote, violate a 1983 use agreement negotiated between the airport and national park.
Albright in that letter cited eight specific flights when Chambers’ Robinson R44 helicopter flew below the 2,000-foot floor, the lowest at 616.5 feet above ground nearly four miles away from the airport. He said those flights were just “the tip of the iceberg” of a persistent problem of low-level flights by Wind River Air over noise-sensitive areas of the park, potentially disturbing wildlife.
But Chambers said on Tuesday, as he has said previously, “That 2,000-foot advisory, that is not a law or regulation, that is a request. So there are no violations. ... Basically every one of those flights is completely per the code of regulations. There was nothing wrong with any of those flights.”
However, Teton Park Chief of Staff Jeremy Barnum, while acknowledging the 2,000-foot floor is not a hard-and-fast rule, said, “We would absolutely ask all operators to abide by that 2,000-foot FAA advisory. I think it’s better for residents, it’s better for visitors, and it’s certainly better for the wildlife that draws people from around the world to this ecosystem.”
Barnum added, “Common sense would suggest that something like a helicopter, the closer it is, the more disturbing it is to wildlife and others.”
Smith, the FAA operations inspector, and Luke Collison, principal operations director with the FAA’s Denver office, could not be reached for comment on the status of the FAA’s investigation or potential sanctions that could arise, if any.
Chambers was cleared of wrongdoing after an FAA investigation into claims of park overflights last spring and said Tuesday that he has not been contacted by the FAA regarding an ongoing investigation.
Barnum and Daley noted, too, that Chambers’ Wind River Air isn’t the only operation accused of low-level park overflights. Daley cited “operators that aren’t originating out of the Jackson Hole Airport and are coming in from Montana.”
“This is a much larger issue than just Wind River Air and Tony Chambers,” Daley said.
Albright, the ranch owner and retired journalist, said Tuesday he intends to submit additional data and information about low-level flights over public lands by mid-April directly to the FAA.
Daley said the Conservation Alliance’s goal is pretty clear cut.
“Ultimately, the Alliance would like to see a permanent ban of scenic helicopter tours over Grand Teton National Park,” she said. “And you see movement towards that in a lot of other national parks that are now backtracking and backpedaling a little bit about how they manage scenic helicopter tours, including parks out in Hawaii. And you see this in Glacier [National Park] as well.”
 
This story was posted on March 30, 2022