New Jersey and New York congressional members have proposed a bill that would ban “non-essential” helicopter flights like the one that crashed on April 10. The bill comes at the same time a citizens group has asked federal officials for an immediate ban.
Roughly a month after a tourist helicopter plunged into the Hudson River near Jersey City, killing all six people aboard, a federal bill has been introduced that would ban tourist and other “non-essential” helicopter flights within a 20-mile radius of the Statue of Liberty.
The bipartisan bill, proposed by U.S. Reps. Rob Menendez (D-8th Dist.), Jerrold Nadler (D-Manhattan), and Nicole Malliotakis (R-Staten Island), would ground non-essential helicopter flights starting 60 days after it is signed into law.
The bill exempts police, medical, disaster and emergency response, infrastructure maintenance and other helicopter flights deemed to be in the public good, including news media helicopters.
A bi-state citizen group, Stop the Chop, asked for an “immediate ban” on non-essential flights over the New York Metropolitan area in a May 21 letter to U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy and FAA Administrator Chris Rocheleau.
A tourist helicopter broke apart into three pieces in midair and crashed into the Hudson River near Jersey City at 3:15 p.m. on April 10. All six people on board were killed, including a family of five from Spain visiting New York City and the pilot.
The National Transportation Safety Board is still investigating the cause.
That crash involved a tourist helicopter that was based in Kearny and flew over densely populated Jersey City and Hoboken neighborhoods to reach Manhattan.
“In light of the recent tragedy on April 10 and the ongoing Air Traffic Control shortages in the area, the risks of having more than 100 of these flights cross right over our heads every day is undeniable and needs to be put to an end,” Nick Wierda, a Stop the Chop member and Jersey City resident, said. “We are urging the federal government, the only body with real regulatory power over our skies, to do just that.”
The letter supports the Menendez bill and made it clear that “we support and respect the vital role of helicopters in medical, law enforcement, military, and emergency operations. We are not calling for any changes to flight paths or rules governing essential aircraft.”
Hoboken, Jersey City and New York City councils passed resolutions calling on the Federal Aviation Administration to ban non-essential helicopter traffic over and near populated urban areas in the wake of the crash.
The FAA has jurisdiction over the nation’s airspace.
The FAA took similar action on March 14 in the wake of a deadly collision between a military helicopter and a commuter jet that killed 67 people on Jan. 29 by banning helicopter traffic from the busy airspace near Reagan Airport in Washington. That ban exempted presidential flights, law enforcement and air ambulance flights.
It also resulted in the FAA convening a helicopter safety roundtable in April with safety experts, government and industry representatives, where the Hudson River crash was mentioned.
Residents said the FAA needs to do the same thing in New York and New Jersey, citing air space that is as congested as in Washington D.C., and the safety risk of flights over densely populated neighborhoods.
“For years this has been a major quality of life issue that has continued to worsen,” said Melissa Elstein, Stop the Chop board chair. “On high-traffic days, usually weekends when the weather is clear, we see many times north of 100 helicopters zipping out to the Hudson and back in, skimming our roofs, shaking our houses, so close you can see the passengers inside.”
Bailey Wood, a spokesperson for Vertical Aviation International, an association of helicopter operators, pilots, owners and manufacturers said accident data says the fatality rate per 100,000 hours of flight are the lowest since 2007.
“The legislation is as misguided as it is short sighted as the future of vertical flight is about to take off in ways we only once imagined,“ he said.
Advanced air mobility aircraft, like those from Joby, Archer, Supernal and others, will grow the existing helicopter industry to connect people more efficiently across urban, suburban, and rural area, reducing travel time, easing congestion, and creating a new paradigm of accessible and sustainable transportation, Wood said.
A total of 8,848 flights went over New York City land or water in May 2023, and a large portion of these flights are non-essential, Menendez said in a March letter to Duffy. An estimated 43% are tours originating from the Downtown Manhattan Heliport, the Kearny Heliport and Linden Airport.
Helicopters are subject to different minimum altitude restrictions than airplanes, said an FAA spokesperson.
Airplanes must fly at least 1,000 feet above the nearest obstacle when over densely populated areas. Helicopter pilots must fly so they don’t pose a hazard to people or property on the ground, said Rick Breitenfeldt an FAA spokesperson.
“Helicopters typically fly over the New York and New Jersey area using Visual Flight Rules (VFR) and just outside Newark (airport) Class B airspace,” he said. “Pilots operating VFR use the see-and-avoid method to conduct their flights. The responsibility for flying neighborly resides with the pilot operating the helicopter.”
But residents familiar with the fly neighborly program said that isn’t being adhered to, given the low altitudes they said they’ve observed.
“People in the helicopter industry claim that they do everything they can to “fly neighborly,” but that has not been our experience,” Wierda said. “They fly loud and low, with no regard for our safety or sanity.”
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Larry Higgs may be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on X @CommutingLarry.
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