Four backcountry airstrips in Idaho’s Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness known as the “Big Creek Four” have been deemed emergency use only as outlined by a recent legal settlement.
Note the term ‘wilderness character’.
Eco-activist pressure is so bad that Parks Canada wants to close a strip beside the freeway west of Calgary AB because airplanes might disturb wildlife.
Sure, I say, aircraft noise must be worse than heavy truck noise, biggest problem for wildlife is bears and ungulates jumping fences to eat new grass and other plants early in spring but being careless about vehicles.
And for humans - stoopids stopping to gawk at the animals can result in motor vehicle accidents.
So USFS, parks agencies, researchers, … won’t be able to use the strips unless there’s a forest fire in the area?
A grass strip that is not used recreationally won’t be maintained for emergency use.
I’d hate for a pilot experiencing an emergency to die after attempting a landing there.
Aviation is the least impactful way to get to the backcountry. No roads are involved, migrations are not impacted, you fly over the environment, land, enjoy it and fly back.
This is exactly correct. I know many pilots who help maintain back country strips in Idaho and Montana. Pilots are the least impactful on the environment and what exactly is “damaging the wildlife character”?
Sorry…“damaging wilderness character”
I would hope that the NPS also banned surface vehicles with ICE motivators, such as four-wheelers, motorcycles, AWD pickups, etc, or this whole thing is pretty much a sham. Ground vehicles do far more damage to the environment that an airplane does. Airplanes don’t leave trails and ruts in the forest, run over animals, possibly spark fires from poorly maintained exhaust pipes or overheated catalytic converters. Pilots rarely leave their trash behind, throw beer bottles and cans in the brush or use the trees and animals as target practice with the gun they brought along “just for fun”. In fact, if you were to ask park rangers what their biggest problems are for keeping the parks “pristine”, i doubt that pilots and airplanes even make the top ten.
Perhaps we could start a movement to further open the US environment by closing it to “environmentalists”.
New backcountry rules from people who never leave the city.
I completely agree with Jack_Woodhead and slipstream!
‘character of’ is becoming a favourite of eco-activists, used regularly where I live to oppose building housing for humans.
I like to ask who is exhibiting ‘character’ by their opposition to doing something for humans. 
The environmental wackos conspire with Federal Agencies to sue the agency to get the policy outcomes they both desire through court ordered consent agreements.
They do this to get around Congress and the rule making process.
We in aviation need to wake up to that tactic now before private flying is put out of business.
Here is a link that puts more context to the article here in avweb.
Like many stories on the web these days, there is the macro report that can incite…comments…then if one is interested, some digging can find more depth to the issue. For example:
“The Forest Service has long bowed to pressure from aviators,” the plaintiffs said in a news release Tuesday. “Years ago, rather than state clearly its determination that these sites were closed to all landings, the agency labeled them ‘emergency use only,’ a phrase that pilots have long chosen to ignore, instead treating the sites as open for public use.”
So when you look at the actual complaint you find this:
The Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness was established by the 1980
Central Idaho Wilderness Act (CIWA), under the general provisions of the Wilderness Act of 1964. Both the Wilderness Act and CIWA forbid aircraft landings within the Frank ChurchRiver of No Return Wilderness, with only narrow, specific exceptions, and direct the Forest Service to protect and preserve its wilderness character.
Well now…if that is the case then while the phrase “wilderness character” is somewhat puerile (though it maybe in the original Act), aviators using landing strips that were not meant for recreational use does make this a viable case.
Perhaps these aviators were working under the premise of “ask for forgiveness before permission”?
My own view is that the groups presented poorly the Suite against the forest service. I agree that pilots in general are more respective of a wilderness environment, tend to be “cleaner” in where they park (least garbage flies into a prop or control surface), and looking at some photos, these are not strips for your typical GA aircraft (or GA pilot. I would not fly in there with the experience I had flying in my time). The groups would have been better to focus simply on GA ignoring a FS rule and the FS turning a blind eye. Bringing up planes being “harmful” to wildlife dilutes the point and opens the door to folks to make fun of the people, not see the real issue.
What we don’t know is if these groups went to aviation groups to see if something could be worked out or they also just “knee-jerked” a view that pilots are jerks, because they were basically violating a regulation. Instead a law suit they could have worked with the FS and the state of Idaho to provide limited recreational access with FS monitoring and strict violating of aviators that then break the rules. This way this wilderness can be enjoyed and aviators could become an early reporting tool for FS for fires or other issues impacting the wilderness.
No, lets just knee-jerk and make fun of people before we learn anything more about the root of people’s actions.
Hmmmm…Well I live in a rural part on my State and County. I choose so because I did not want a lot of people living around me. So I do enjoy the 'character of ’ where I live and would support any group that opposes development that negatively impacts where I live.
that being said, it is not the development I oppose, it is the free for all approach with no concern on how development may impact an area. 20 minutes up the road is a small town now being overgrown by development. 2 lane secondary’s that mainly handled traffic out of the town to rural farms and homes now have a number of 100+ housing developments with no change to the road structure causing backups and increased accidents. The developer makes money, the builder makes money and the land owner (who may wind up not living there any more) makes money, but those left have to deal with the mess and watch as the quiet life is diminished.
Perhaps if We developed smarter, not maximize a few own’s profits people would not be so opposed to new development. There are ways to preserve ‘the character of’ an area but it takes actual cooperation and my observation is that Greed or lack of empathy pretty much kills that quickly.
One thing not mentioned here is the decades of IAA Presidents that have urged pilots to minimize use of the airstrips due to their sensitive nature. Pilots have been landing there for decades with no issue from anyone else, yet it appears as though the YouTube pilots who have turned what is a challenging approach and landing into a conquest for internet points helped drive the last few nails in the coffin. Adding to that are the pilots who’ve left a few bent pieces of carbon fiber up there for others to see.
There’s a lot of pearl clutching at this going on, blaming this on ecomentalists and the like. I am not surprised by it and expect more of it, and I blame pilots not ecomentalists. Ever hear something to the effect of “this spot was great before it got popular”? Years ago before youtube was huge and instagram was a thing, “urban exploration” was still fairly popular and atmospheric and intriguing spots were shared person to person, or in web rings or newsgroups. Many abandoned places survived untouched for years as long as the wrong people didn’t get wind of them. A couple of successful urban exploring youtube channels emerged in the 2010s and eventually there were dozens of them, and dozens more on instagram. The ones that share the spots “blow them up” immediately, the vandals show up and trash the place, breaking glass and defacing with their ugly spray paint. Some video creators wait until places they can’t hide are demolished or in progress to share videos about them. If you’ve read this far you might be thinking of the “flying cowboys” youtubers and their rich kids with flying ATV antics, them and their copycats are our vandals. A difficult and picturesque backcountry strip goes from a place campers and polite recreational pilots fly into from time to time to a destination for showoffs with six figure flying ATVs. A wide river valley going from a place where a few fly in to fish or camp to a place where the bush pilot trenders start skimming the water with their balloon tires and making difficult approaches for internet clout. We already know it’s happening because these channels are huge and more have popped up, we’ve already seen the dregs among them crash an airplane for fun and suffer little consequence and nose over on a difficult landing made for no reason other than catching it on video. I can see this “blowing up the spot” and I bet it’s a factor in this restriction and those to come.
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