Air Tour Controversy Swirls Over Grand Teton

Joe Albright has seen eagles, deer and moose around the guest ranch, a few miles from the Grand Teton National Park boundary, that he and his wife bill as “Your Own Private Wilderness.”

He hopes that things don’t change if helicopters carrying sightseers start flying.

Environmentalists and some local residents want to ban helicopters that would give tourists a bird’s-eye view of the area’s rugged beauty, saying the noise and low-flying aircraft could disturb animals and tourists who want quiet.

Those claims frustrate Gary Kauffman, manager of Vortex Aviation Services, which plans to start flights this month from Jackson Hole Airport. The airport is within the boundary of Grand Teton National Park.

“They make it sound like it’s something new to the area,” Kauffman said, noting that tours have been conducted in the area before his. He doesn’t plan to fly over the park or “hover” on his proposed routes, and the helicopters are relatively quiet, he said.

Opponents say that allowing one operator into the area could lead to more, and disturbances.

Officials with Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks say there are other ways to sightsee.

“One of the reasons people come to an area such as Jackson Hole is to experience natural sounds--the running water, the sound of the wind,” said George Helfrich, management assistant at Grand Teton. “And helicopters, or any other kind of scenic flight, could interfere with that.”

Steve Bassett, president of the U. S. Air Tour Assn., said air tours allow visitors who are older, handicapped or on a tight schedule to see more of a park than they otherwise might.

The issue around the jagged peaks of the Tetons is not an isolated one.

Commercial air tours fly over about 50 units of the National Park Service, many of them parks, said Marvin Jensen, manager for the service’s Soundscape Program Center in Fort Collins, Colo.

At Grand Canyon National Park, 90,000 air tours are flown each year and as many as 653 are flown a day during the peak of the summer season, said the park’s Ken Weber.

“There is an impact to a resource, and that resource is quiet,” said Weber, branch chief of social science research in the Science Center. “People come here for solitude and quiet and reflection.”

At Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park, where there were concerns about a potentially large number of air tours, a ban on scenic overflights began in 1997, said Peter Allen, a spokesman.

Congress last year passed the National Parks Air Tour Management Act, which sets guidelines for air tours. It also allows for park-specific management plans, developed with public comment by the Park Service and Federal Aviation Administration, in areas where operators want to do business. Options range from allowing tour flights to banning them over certain parks.

Teton Aviation Center of Driggs, Idaho, has expressed interest in flying tours over Grand Teton National Park when a management plan is done, said Steve Phillips, who is in charge of the flight department. The company, which uses airplanes and gliders, is keeping its popular tours west of the park now, he said. It has not received complaints about its operations, he added.

The FAA had ruled, in the case of Vortex, that the air tour act would not apply because the company plans to fly outside the park.

Officials say Grand Teton is the only national park with a jet airport within its boundary--Jackson Hole Airport--from which Kauffman proposes taking off and landing. But he said it should be no more upsetting to people than the steady stream of airplanes at the airport daily.

“The nature of a commercial air tour is to be somewhat close to the ground,” said Carl Schneebeck of the Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance, which opposes area scenic helicopter tours.

Natural sounds are considered as much a part of the parks as bison, elk, birds or trees. Visitors, Jensen said, want to hear them.

“To assume there’s no noise ever, whether it’s transitory or fleeting, is a stretch,” said Roy Resavage, president of Helicopter Assn. International, a trade group for the civil helicopter industry.

Sen. Craig Thomas (R-Wyo.) has proposed legislation banning commercial air tour flights, fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters over Grand Teton and Yellowstone.

But Bassett said the management act can address local concerns. Aircraft are getting quieter and operators do act responsibly, he added.

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On the Net:

Grand Teton National Park: https://https://www.nps.gov/grte

/index.htm

Yellowstone National Park: https://https://www.nps.gov/yell

/index.htm

U.S. Air Tour Assn.: https://https://www.usata.com/

Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance: https://https://www.jhalliance.com/