Operator Didn't Have "Part 135" Air Taxi And Commuter Certificate

Ah, to be in Hawaii. The sun, the ocean, the hula girls - and those fabulous air tours.

Not so fast. The FAA is seeking a $50,000 civil penalty against Tora Flight Adventures, aka Tora Flight Adventure Club, Rainbow Connections, and Hawaii Sky Tours, reported the Honolulu Advertiser.

The notice of proposed civil penalty that alleges the company ran air tours from 2003 to April 2006 that required Part 135 certification was issued April 6, 2007. The company is permitted to appeal the proposed fine.

Company owner John Weiser, former owner of KUMU radio on Oahu, was unavailable for comment.

Although it is not clear whether Tora Flight Adventures is still operating, spokesman for the FAA's Western-Pacific Region Ian Gregor said, "To our knowledge, Tora has stopped operating as a Part 135."

According to a story on Slack and Davis's Web site, a Texas-based legal firm whose practice includes aviation law, commercial and general aviation crashes, business and general aviation contracts, and personal injury law, Panda Ranch, where many Tora tour go, is a private Molokai residence that has an address near Honolulu International Airport.

Sources on Molokai named John Weiser as the owner of both the company and the large agricultural lot at Papohaku Ranchlands on Molokai's West End where the grassy airstrip is located.

The company apparently caters to visitors from Japan; tourists are picked up in Honolulu, flown to the West End and then driven around the island before being flown back to Oahu.

Edie Anderson, retired owner of The Molokai Dispatch, a weekly newspaper on the island, lived on the West End for 19 years and had contacted the FAA and county authorities on "numerous occasions," warning them about what she considered an unsafe operation in her neighborhood.

Anderson gave a list of reasons that had her fearing the worst of Weiser's tours, including the grassy airstrip far from emergency services; questionable lighting at the strip even though planes take off and land at night; and deer on the airstrip.

Anderson said once Weiser's tourists arrive on Molokai, they are driven around the island in different vehicles, including an amphibious craft known as a "duck boat" and a white limousine that has a license plate that reads "Tora 3."'

She said there were often three or four small planes and a helicopter at the residence. Other private pilots with West End ties, she added, also use the airstrip to land and take off.

Diane Nichols of the Molokai Visitors Bureau said the Tora Flight Adventure Club was not a member of the association.

Tora has been under FAA investigation since 2003. On April 25, 2005, the FAA sent a cease operations letter to the company because it didn't have a Part 135 certificate. Five days later, one of Tora's planes crashed after takeoff from its private airstrip on Molokai, injuring four Japanese tourists, as ANN reported.

Some Hawaii air tours operate under Part 91 general aviation certification, but are restricted to a 25-mile range and must depart and land from the same point, with no stops in between.

The distance between Honolulu Airport and Moloki is greater than 25 miles, and the Panda Ranch flights included a stop, which should have prevented the company from operating air tours without Part 135 certification, according to the FAA.

An NTSB report documents correspondence between the FAA's Honolulu Flight Standards District Office and Tora Flight Adventures over whether the company was required to have Part 135 certification.

The FAA had cited several safety concerns regarding the company, including no pilot drug-testing program, unsafe aircraft, passengers flown in a helicopter by an unqualified pilot, noncompliance with air tour rules that require flotation equipment, and allegations that company employees were told to ignore Part 135 rules once certification was complete, "to the point of falsification of records if necessary to show compliance."

The company denied the allegations.

Despite claims by Tora Flight Adventures that it was merely transporting passengers to Panda Ranch, an NTSB investigator reported finding numerous mentions of air tours offered by the company on its Web site and other travel sites.

An unidentified tour agency told the investigator that it averaged 100 Tora Flight Adventures bookings a month, mostly to Japanese tourists. A second tour company said it booked 210 passengers for Panda Ranch visits in 2005, the NTSB report said.

FMI: www.ntsb.gov, www.faa.gov, www.hawaiiweb.com/html/hawaii_sky_tours.html