Posted on: Tuesday, July 17, 2001

FAA rules to affect tour flights

By Johnny Brannon
Advertiser Staff Writer

Federal aviation and parks officials will soon begin crafting new regulations to spell out how tour airplanes and helicopters can fly over and around Haleakala National Park on Maui, and Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island.

The rules could determine how close such aircraft may fly to the parks, the times they may operate, the number of flights, and what routes will be available, said Don Hamilton, the Federal Aviation Administration's local official who is handling the issue.

The challenge will be to balance the flight needs of air tour operators with the FAA's concerns about safety, and with complaints that environmentalists and park users have raised about noise, Hamilton said.

"You've got to find some middle ground so that everyone can share the national parks," he said. "It's going to be for everyone's benefit."

The public will have ample opportunity to voice concerns about the situation before the FAA and National Park Service adopt Air Tour Management Plans for each park, Hamilton said. FAA officials have met with air tour operators to start discussing the plans, but it will be several months before actual drafting of the rules begins or public meetings are held, he said.

Federal legislation approved last year requires most national parks that are affected by air tours to create such management plans, but Hawai'i's are expected to be the first. The industry's early rapid growth here — and several high-profile crashes — have long drawn attention.

"We've looked at this issue for years now," said

Hamilton. "It's fitting that we do this first because we have some background."

Forty-eight people have been killed in nine sightseeing tour crashes in Hawaii over the past ten years, according to the National Transportation Safety Board. Ten people died in the worst accident, when a small plane crashed on the slopes of Mauna Loa in Volcanoes park in September 1999.

Emergency rules to remain

Emergency restrictions the FAA imposed on tour flights throughout the islands in 1994 will remain in effect after the national park rules are adopted. The 1994 action, prompted by a rash of fatal crashes, generally requires that tour pilots fly no lower than 1,500 feet anywhere in the state. Companies with good safety records can obtain waivers that allow them to fly as low as 500 feet in uninhabited areas, however, and most tour operators that want the special permission have obtained it.

Hamilton said the FAA's goal is to ensure safety and address concerns about noise in the parks —not stamp out the air tour industry.

"We think air tour operators provide a valuable service," he said. "They allow elderly and disabled people and those with limited time to see the parks."

Seven of the state's 25 air tour companies are based on Maui, and four more are on the Big Island. David Chevalier, owner of Blue Hawaiian Helicopters, said the only practical way to view some sites, such as active lava flows or remote waterfalls, is from the air. Air tours are an important part of the tourism industry and should not be harshly restricted, he said.

"There are so many things you can't see otherwise," said Chevalier, whose company operates 15 helicopters on the two islands and is the state's largest. "Most of the areas we do helicopter tours in Volcanoes (park) aren't anywhere around where people can get to."

But some environmentalists say aircraft noise can wreck the park experience for others. "Fat cats can ride in comfort and look at it from up high, but that just ruins it for the rest of us down below," said David Henkin, an attorney with the Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund. "There needs to be a recognition that in many instances, air tours are incompatible with the park's mission. Having helicopters buzzing overhead ruins the natural splendor."

For the past six years, tour planes and helicopters have operated under voluntary restrictions around Haleakala, and officials say that has helped lessen the impact that flights have there.

Tour operators are no longer supposed to fly over the Haleakala crater at all unless weather conditions force them to, and they must then fly out as soon as they can, said park aviation manager Ron Nagata.

He said not all pilots fully comply with the restrictions, however.

Some break rules

"Sometimes some pilots just want to give people a closer look," he said. "Sometimes they hover and generate a lot of noise, and sometimes they improperly make turns, so we still get occasional noise complaints."

Chevalier said such problems are usually caused by new pilots who haven't been well trained about the voluntary restrictions. He said tour operators take complaints seriously.

The voluntary restrictions served as a model for the legislation requiring the new park management plans. That law, co-sponsored by Hawai'i's Sen. Daniel Akaka and Arizona's Sen. John McCain, was a reasonable compromise between environmental groups and the air tour industry, and the new rules can be, too, Chevalier said. "As long as the process is fair, it should be a win-win for everyone involved," he said.

Park officials are also concerned about the impact that flights and noise may have on wildlife, such as endangered nene geese, Nagata said.

Doug Lentz, management assistant at Volcanoes park, said officials also want to make sure areas sacred to native Hawaiians are respected.

"Our big concerns are being sensitive to sacred sites, visibility and sound," he said. "People go into the wilderness to get away from it all, to have solitude."

Helicopters sometimes hover around the Pu'u 'o'o lava vent of Mauna Loa volcano, and around points where lava enters the ocean, said Lentz.

Tour operators will have to obtain FAA permits to continue flying around the parks once the new rules are adopted. Companies could lose their permits if they fail to comply.

Hamilton said the FAA had not set a deadline for creating the new management plans, and he declined to estimate how long the process could take.

Nagata said he doubted everyone would be happy with the new rules, but that all concerns would be taken into account.

"I suspect the public won't be totally satisfied, and neither will the tour operators," said Nagata. "There has to be a compromise."

You can reach Johnny Brannon at jbrannon@honoluluadvertiser.com or 535-2431.