Authorities Allegedly Did Not Want News Helicopters Over Violent Street Riots After A Teenager Was Killed

The TFR established over Ferguson, MO, in August that restricted flights in more than 37 square miles of airspace over the city appears to have been put in place, at least in part, to prevent the news media from flying helicopters over the area.

That information was revealed by an unnamed FAA manager speaking during a recorded telephone conversation obtained by the Associated Press. The manager said the St. Louis County Police Department admitted that they wanted to restrict media access to the airspace over downtown Ferguson where the riots were occurring. In another recorded conversation, a manager at the Kansas City Center said that the police "...did not care if you ran commercial traffic through this TFR all day long, they didn't want the media in there."

Other parts of the transcript depict discussions between FAA personnel trying to craft language that would assure that media aircraft were not allowed in the area. One FAA manager says "there's no option for a TFR that says, you know, 'OK, everybody but the media is OK'."

St. Louis Police had said that the flight restrictions were not targeted at the media, but were intended to prevent aircraft from being targeted by gunfire from the rioters. One police helicopter was reportedly fired at, but was not damaged. An FAA manager said in the recorded conversation that the shootings were "unconfirmed rumors."

The recordings were obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. In a statement released Sunday, FAA Administrator Michael Huerta said the agency will always give top consideration to safety, but the agency "...cannot and will never exclusively ban media from covering an event of national significance, and media was never banned from covering the ongoing events in Ferguson in this case."

Aero-Commentary:
That's right, Mr. Huerta, the media should not be the target of such manipulation.

As in every profession, there are those in the media who are responsible and those who are not. But a free media is specifically protected by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Just because someone does not want a story to be told does not mean that it should not be told. Rather, those stories usually are the ones that SHOULD be told.

The public does have a right to know. Attempting to control media access to such an event of national significance through heavy-handed federal intervention should never be tolerated. We hope you will make every effort to learn who those involved are, and take appropriate action.

FMI: www.faa.gov