Tree planting a blessing
A big mahalo from the many users of the Wailua Multipath/Ke Al Hele Makalae to those who recently planted over 30 niu, hala and other trees at the Kumukumu Bridge area.
In 10 years, we will have forgotten about the ugly tree cutting done there a few years back.
Plant a tree, help the environment.
Dana Bekeart, Kapa‘a
Helicopters, tours need more regulation
We need to support Hawai‘i Rep. Ed Case on the reintroduction of his bill to regulate tour helicopters in Hawai‘i.
He recently reintroduced the Safe and Quiet Skies Act HR 389 from the 116th Congress. The bill is needed to ensure that helicopter flights are adequately regulated to ensure in-air and on-ground safety and address widespread and accelerating community disruption.
This bill would first require the Federal Aviation Administration to implement the National Transportation Safety Board’s recommended enhanced safety regulations. It would also prohibit flights over federal property that requires privacy, dignity, and respect, to include military installations, national cemeteries and parks, wildlife refuges and wilderness.
It would further require the use of standard equipment to monitor the location of flights, apply the “sterile cockpit rule” to tour flights (meaning in part that the pilot could not also be the tour guide), prohibit flights lower than 1,500 feet over actual ground, and limit decibel levels to those commonly applied to operations in residential areas.
Additionally, the bill would allow states, localities, and tribes to impose stricter regulations on tour flights in their jurisdictions with required public engagement. This is an important bill to support as the helicopter industry has almost no regulations regarding decibel levels over our state park wilderness areas. The bill needs to include state parks, not just federal jurisdiction.
The helicopter industry on Kaua‘i employs just a few hundred people and yet the impacts of noise pollution affect most people and wildlife on the ground and in the air space.
I recently took a helicopter ride over Kaua‘i, and it had been over 20 years since flying. I must say I enjoy flying in them so much, but when I am on the ground hiking in Kalalau or standing on Nualolo ridge, it is an assault to my ears to listen to the roar of the helicopters. I wondered, with all the remote places on Kaua‘i, the helicopters can fly without interrupting people, why can’t they avoid flying over our remote hiking areas and give people and wildlife some peace and quiet? It would be a neighborly Kaua‘i thing to do.
The Napali Coast State Wilderness Park including Kalalau has limited permits for camping and regulations are in place to protect the environment from excessive use, trash, and pollution. However, what about the noise pollution from the helicopter industry?
Kalalau is a place of refuge to get back to nature and that includes listening to birds, waterfalls, and the sounds of the wind. However, the noise pollution from the helicopter industry makes it sound like a war zone when one is hiking into the valley. I have seen helicopters flying in the range of the white-tailed tropicbird, or koa‘e kea. There are also the pu‘eo or native owls and the apapane forest birds who are affected.
We need to support Rep. Case and we can request our state legislature and the FAA to monitor and provide better regulation and oversight of helicopter noise levels and flight safety issues on Kaua‘i.
We can suggest limiting sound levels on the ground and the establishment of quiet no-fly zone areas over parts of Koke‘e and all the Kalalau Valley, Honopu, Awapuhi and Nualolo valleys. These steep valleys have been the location for serious helicopter crashes. It is past the time that the helicopters were regulated to avoid these narrow steep valleys to stop sound pollution and make the tours safer for the general public.
Last summer, I was hiking in Kalalau valley with friends from the mainland. The sound of the helicopters roaring over the valley made it impossible to even have a conversation without yelling. The Napali valleys are narrow and steep and sound amplifies and bounces making one helicopter sound like dozens. There is no way to get away from the sound of the helicopters except to swim or stand right by Kalalau stream. Most of them are flying much lower than 1500 feet and there appears to be no regulation of flight patterns.
It is time that we start implementing changes to the routes, speed and altitudes of helicopter tours and establish noise reductions in the sacred valleys and wilderness areas of Kaua‘i. Support the Safe and Quiet Skies Act HR 389, please speak up as our voices matter.
Please contact Rep. Case office at 808-650-6688 or email him at ed.case@mail.house.gov.
Kaua‘i residents can also contact Rep. Kai Kahele to support the bill HR 389 at 808-746-6220 or email him at senkkahele@capitol.hawaii.gov.
Michaelle Edwards, Princeville
Great article about Safe and Quiet Skies. Thank you. Yes we will contact Ed Case and Kahale.
I highly agree with you, Michaelle! When driving up on the hill at Koke’e State Park. These tour helicopters are flying way to low. It seem like their right on my vehicle roof when zooming by. And at times it’s very startling and scary. Never know what to expect, “is it a crashing helicopter overhead?” The noise pollution is so loud and hard on one’s ears.
Hope fully Mr. Case Act HR 389 pass.
P.S,
Could it be , “why our birds are going extinct up in our forest land?” Because of the fumes that the birds are inhaling.