Helicopter Companies Push To Reopen New Plan Restricting Air Tours Over Volcanoes Park
The air tour management plan for Hawaii Volcanoes National Park is meant to address noise and environmental concerns. The industry says the new rules compromise safety.
The lead trade association for U.S. air tour operators is challenging a management plan for Hawaii Volcanoes National Park that went into effect in June, arguing it’s unsafe for pilots, blocks access for visitors with mobility issues and is squeezing air tours financially.
The plan drastically reduces the number of helicopter sightseeing flights allowed over the park, restricts the routes and altitudes that can be flown and designates at least 60 no-fly days per year, including Sundays. It does not limit tours on other routes over the Big Island.
Proponents of the Volcanoes plan say the measures are needed to limit damage to natural and cultural resources and disruptive noise generated by helicopter tourism.
The industry and operators say they are supportive of those goals, but want the plan to be redone to address concerns about pilot and passenger safety and visitor access to the park.
鈥淲ith altitude restrictions they have in place, it doesn鈥檛 provide the flexibility the pilots need to deviate for weather,鈥 said Cade Clark, chief government affairs officer for Vertical Aviation International, the trade group that filed .
Clark said VAI wants to assure “that we’re working with the community and the industry to get the best possible outcome.鈥
But residents who live under or close to the flight path say the management plan was overdue and needs to stay in place.
Mountain View resident Daryl Soares, one of the residents who pushed for the management plan, was surprised by the filing.
鈥淲e thought this was a done deal,鈥 he said.
Soares said before the plan went into effect, helicopters would fly over his home every 20 minutes. The difference since the plan went into effect has been 鈥渘ight and day,鈥 he said.
The reduction in air tour traffic could also be the result of a downturn in tourist numbers on the Big Island due to the lack of volcanic activity, said Rob Pacheco of hiking tour company Hawai Forest and Trail.
State data confirms that Big Island tourism has been soft compared to the same period in 2023. Air tour landings at Hilo International Airport during June were down 40% compared to June 2023 according to Department of Transportation data.
The Volcanoes air tour plan “severely curtails the economic viability of air tour operators,” and vacating it while a new plan is developed would provide economic relief to operators, the filing said.
The case is all about money, Soares said, and operators “have no respect for people who live on the ground.”
‘Arbitrary And Capricious’
The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Park Service were required to develop management plans for commercial air tours over national parks and tribal lands after Congress passed the National Parks Air Tour Management Plan Act in 2000.
But it took almost two decades for the first of those plans to be developed and it took litigation by a group of Hawaii residents and the nonprofit Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility to kickstart the process.
A resulted in a federal court order leading to two dozen plans nationwide, including for Hawaii Volcanoes National Park and Haleakala National Park. The Haleakala plan is not mentioned in the VAI petition.
The Hawaii Volcanoes Air Tour Management Plan, finalized in December, authorizes 1,550 air tours a year, compared to 11,300 before the plan. It also designates three routes that avoid the summit of Kilauea, restricts flight times to between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. and bans flights on Wednesdays and Sundays and certain holidays, with some exceptions for aircraft with quiet technology.
Vertical Aviation International management plans when they enable air tour operators to “conduct their business cooperatively with national park units.” But the plans can also have severe financial consequences for operators like Safari Helicopters Hawaii, co-plaintiffs in the suit.
Before the plan, Safari was permitted 3,920 flights per year over Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. That number is now 185, according to the filing.
The is that the FAA and NPS violated the Administration Practices Act by not “meaningfully evaluating” two issues that were raised in the 60-day public comment period required by federal legislation.
One was the issue of aircraft safety, and the other was the impact of reduced operations on people with disabilities or mobility issues who would be denied reasonable access to the park. The plan is therefore “arbitrary and capricious,” the filing said.
Cade said that VAI wanted the FAA to evaluate the public comments about safety in greater detail, and consider input from the National Parks Overflights Advisory Group, an FAA body that includes representatives from the industry.
Colleen Teubner, policy and litigation attorney for Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, based in Washington, D.C., said she was not intimately familiar with the Volcanoes case, but has been working on another legal action brought by VAI over air tours in South Dakota.
In that case, the court granted PEER and the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks status as intervenors for the defendants, the FAA and NPS.
VAI was seeking to stay a ban on air tours over Badlands National Park and Mount Rushmore National Memorial while it appealed the management plan.
The court in that case denied VAI鈥檚 request, finding that the FAA and NPS had followed the procedure laid out in federal legislation. That might be an indication of in the Volcanoes petition, Teubner said.
Media representatives for the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Park Service said they do not provide comment on pending litigation.
