Air tour operators lose in bid to block routes

Thursday, April 19, 2001 | 11:33 a.m.

Southern Nevada-based Grand Canyon air tour operators began flying two new flight routes today after their bid for an injunction to block implementation of them was rejected by a Washington D.C. court.

Jim Petty, president of Air Vegas Airlines, said his 30 pilots would begin training on the new routes while lawyers representing the U.S. Air Tour Association regroup to consider their options. The eight aircraft and helicopter companies flying Grand Canyon tours from three Las Vegas-area airports have about 150 pilots.

The new routes, which cut off 50 miles of flying on the west end of the Grand Canyon as well as a meandering route along the Colorado River to the Grand Canyon airport for air-and-ground tours, were announced last month by the FAA.

About 800,000 passengers take air tours over the Grand Canyon every year, many of them from foreign countries marketed by the Las Vegas tourism industry.

Petty explained that each company has "check pilots" that already have received training on the routes from the Federal Aviation Administration field office in Las Vegas. Those check pilots then train the rest of the airline's fliers.

Meanwhile, an attorney for the Mountain States Legal Foundation, Denver, which is representing the USATA, said there are no plans to appeal the motions for injunctions rejected by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals in Washington.

However, Bill Thode, one of the attorneys on the case, said the association still plans to challenge FAA rules that capped the number of flights at 1998 levels and designated about 95 percent of the canyon as a no-fly zone.

Those legal challenges were filed prior to the injunction motions and aren't expected to be heard by the court until next fall. Motions are pending to combine the flight caps and the airspace restrictions into one case.

Because the emergency motions were rejected and tour operators have to wait until fall for further appeals to be heard, they now have to modify the way they conduct tours for the 2001 season.

Petty said check pilots would begin riding along with line pilots to get them up to speed on the new routes. He emphasized that passengers would be flown only after all safety issues are addressed. He said his company had no west-end canyon tours scheduled today, giving his company a chance to get some pilots trained.

Petty said his company, which flies about 350 passengers a day on canyon flights from Henderson Executive Airport, would modify tour plans to give customers the best flying experience possible.

To compensate for the shorter route, Petty said his pilots would slow their speeds and fly indirect routes back to their base, giving passengers more time to see attractions at Hoover Dam and Lake Mead.

He said it would be difficult to advertise some of the changes to foreign tourists, since brochures on canyon tours went out to travel agents months ago.

"It's hard to say what we're going to do," Petty said. "We'll see what happens in six months. We still have some other court appeals and possible legislative relief, so we really don't want to plan too many changes until we're sure what's going to happen."

As far as the long-range outlook for the industry, Petty said operators and the USATA will continue to fight for the right to fly over the canyon.

Environmentalists, meanwhile, say they will continue to press for the restoration of natural quiet to the canyon, which was mandated in legislation passed during the administrations of Presidents Reagan and Clinton.

"Our lawsuit is still on," Petty said, "and we still have some political and legislative routes. We're keeping our options open as far as the public is concerned. As for the environmentalists, they're trying their best to keep us out of the canyon, we're trying our best to stay there. We feel we still have a viable, popular product."