FAA probing whether TV stations violated ban on news helicopters
By The Associated Press,
freedomforum.org staff
11.08.01
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NEW YORK — The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating whether television stations in Texas and Florida violated restrictions on news helicopters by covering police chases this week.
In Dallas, a chase involving a stolen lumber truck that was on fire was covered live nationally for nearly 40 minutes yesterday on CNN and Fox News Channel.
Three helicopters following the chase were ordered to land and two did not comply, said John Clabes, spokesman for the FAA in Texas. He was not able to identify who operated the helicopters.
Pilots violating the rules risk losing their licenses, he said.
Meanwhile in Miami, two news helicopters covered a Nov. 5 police chase involving a wayward SUV, The Miami Herald reported Nov. 6. The FAA began its inquiry after receiving a call from one of the stations' competitors.
"We always investigate or look into anything that's brought to our attention," said Kathleen Bergen, a spokeswoman in the FAA's southern regional office in Atlanta, as quoted by the Herald. "The flights may have been perfectly legal — we don't make any assumptions about whether the flights were legal or illegal."
Federal authorities banned news helicopter flights after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, prompting protests from TV stations across the country. On Sept. 28, the rules were amended to allow news helicopters to operate outside a 22-mile radius from the nation's 30 largest airports, said national FAA spokesman Hank Price.
"The rules are so confusing," said Barbara Cochran, president of the Radio-Television News Directors Association. "Everyone has a different interpretation, and you have stations that are not operating on a level playing field. They can't figure out what to do."
It's even murky within the FAA. Clabes said that a blanket ban on news helicopters was still in effect; he was later corrected by Price.
CNN and Fox News Channel carried the Texas police chase from a live feed provided by Dallas TV station KDFW.
"KDFW FOX 4 News relies upon the services of an experienced helicopter contractor, which advises us that it operates at all times in full compliance with all FAA regulations and instructions of air traffic controllers," Maria Barrs, the station's vice president and news director, said in a statement yesterday.
The station's anchors, during the chase, said its helicopter might have to stop following the truck because of airspace restrictions. But it stayed with the story until the driver was taken into custody.
It was unclear if the other helicopters were being operated by TV news stations.
For CNN and Fox News Channel, the bizarre chase provided a brief change from the heavy diet of stories about the war on terrorism. But one cable news channel, MSNBC, ignored the chase entirely.
"There are more important things to be talking about," MSNBC spokesman Mark O'Connor said. "Good God, this is appalling."
O'Connor later admitted that MSNBC had no access to pictures of the flaming truck because its Dallas affiliate, KXAS, did not use its helicopter for fear of breaking FAA rules. MSNBC would not have carried the pictures even if it had them, he said.
"When has MSNBC ever covered news?" asked Fox News Channel spokesman Robert Zimmerman. "It's all sour grapes on their part."
Zimmerman and a CNN spokeswoman defended the coverage, saying the chase was newsworthy.
Meanwhile, the Herald reports that the FAA is investigating whether Miami stations WFOR and WTVJ violated two rules: one limiting newsgathering flights within a 20-mile radius of the Miami International Airport; the other setting a no-fly zone near a local nuclear power plant.
The rules, however, do permit flights through the airport boundary to reach a destination outside it.
WFOR and WTVJ say their coverage of the Nov. 5 chase didn't violate the FAA rules.
WTVJ spokesman Lee Zimmerman says the station's helicopter abided by the rules by maintaining a forward motion and not hovering while within the boundary set around the airport, according to the Herald.
Also, both stations say they received permission from air controllers to fly near the power plant as long as they remained a certain distance away.
Two other stations, WSVN and WPLG, say they didn't cover the chase because they believed the FAA rules prevented them. The owner of the company that rents a helicopter to WPLG called the FAA Nov. 5 to ask why other stations were allowed to fly and he wasn't, the Herald reported.
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