Stacey Woelfel spent 35 years on the faculty of the Missouri School of Journalism.
And for 24 years, he was the news director for KOMU, the University of Missouri-owned NBC affiliate for central Missouri.
“I’ve been a professional journalist since 1981, a college-level educator since 1986 and someone with an opinion I always think someone else wants to hear since 1959.
These are my reflections, musings and rants on the state of journalism today.”
News Blues has posted many of Woelfel’s Substack columns over the past few years.
It’s Time to Retire the Rotors
Like much other technology used in TV news, the helicopter has outlived its usefulness
By Stacey Woelfel
I love to fly. I still remember my first time on a commercial aircraft—nearly 60 years ago—flying with my mother and brother from our home in St. Louis to Los Angeles to visit my father, who was on an extended work assignment there. For the longest time, I could count and remember every time I flew on an airplane (there are far too many now for me to count that anymore).
When I went to work in Florida right after college, I got to fly in an open cockpit biplane, and old Ford Trimotor and the Goodyear blimp.
But the best part of flying while working at WESH-TV was our helicopter.
It was the early 1980s, and helicopters were plentiful in TV news. All three stations doing news in Orlando at that time had their own helicopters, emblazoned with station logos and seen regularly in station promos.
As a 21-year-old photographer just starting my professional career, I was thrilled I’d be able to fly in the helicopter. Most of the other photographers had lost the thrill when it came to flying—or were just plain uncomfortable with it—so a lot of the flying stories fell to me.
The shooting set-up will seem crazy by modern standards.
This is long before bottom-mounted remote cameras with cabin controls inside the helicopter became the norm.
For me to shoot from the chopper, the pilot and I (there was usually no room for a reporter based on weight restrictions) would fly to the location where we wanted to shoot, land and take off the right side door and leave it somewhere safe.
Then I would sit on the floor of the chopper, pull the closest seatbelt out as long as it would go, duct tape the buckle so it didn’t accidentally come undone and then put my feet on the starboard skid and lean out the door to shoot my video. I wish I had a picture of me doing this, but I don’t. So here’s a picture of someone else shooting in pretty much the same way (except I didn’t have the harness he is wearing or the footrest he’s using—I had to put my feet on the actual skid).
This may seem crazy to look at and imagine me leaning out the side of a helicopter to get my video, but I loved it. I was in my early 20s and thought I was invincible. We had some close calls, like my distracted pilot almost running into a radio tower, getting caught in a thunderstorm with the door off (think convertible in a carwash) or taking an illegal, high-speed flight out over the Atlantic Ocean with the skids brushing against the waves. All those risks seem crazy to me now, as does the general notion of using helicopters to collect news footage. The tragic crash in Los Angeles last week is a reminder that these craft are dangerous or even deadly—to their occupants and people on the ground. It’s clear to me it’s time to retire the rotors and ground news helicopters.
I say this with all due respect for the two journalists who lost their lives last week—as well as the person killed on the ground—and I hope it’s not too soon after that tragedy for me to make this argument. Fifty-plus years ago, the news helicopter was a game changer. It allowed news organizations to give viewers an overview of a breaking news scene, putting context to the story that might not be visible from the ground. Fixed wing airplanes could sometimes provide good aerial views, but the ability to circle a scene or hover in place was ideal for news coverage. Think of the aerial footage of truck driver Reginald Denny being pulled from his truck and beaten during the L.A. riots. Think of the aerial footage of houses ablaze in the Palisades Fire. Or think of the aerial footage of that lone white Bronco with O.J. Simpson inside making its way across the Los Angeles freeways. Those indelible and iconic images all came from news helicopters.
But those images come with some very dear costs.
Aside from the actual cost to news organizations to lease and operate their helicopters—some reporting puts that at $1 million per year or more—the human cost is much greater.
While we still mourn the lives lost in Los Angeles last week, the list of those killed in news helicopter accidents is probably longer than you think. Just in the last 20 years in the United States alone, these other fatal accidents have all occurred during news gathering operations:
-December 19, 2023: Two killed when Philadelphia station WPVI-TV’s helicopter crashed in New Jersey on its way back from a story on the Jersey Shore.
-September 16, 2017: One killed when Albuquerque station WRQE-TV’s helicopter crashed in New Mexico.
-March 18, 2014: Two killed as Seattle station KOMO-TV’s helicopter crashed while lifting off from the landing pad at the station, horrifyingly seen by colleagues there at the TV station.
-October 13, 2008: Two killed when Houston station KTRK’s helicopter crashed while traveling to the scene of a shooting in rural Montgomery County, Texas.
-July 27, 2007: Four killed when the two helicopters from Phoenix stations KNXV-TV and KTVK collided with each other while covering a car chase that had five news helicopters in pursuit at one time.
That Phoenix crash not only had the greatest loss of life but also showed some of the most severe dangers in the system, with too many helicopters in the air, not enough space between them and pilots distracted by handling reporting duties on top of flying the aircraft. And we suffered that loss of life for what? A car chase? Even more than 19 years later, that crash and all that have come since—taking 13 lives and injuring 11 others in the U.S. alone—should be for something more than covering car chases.
Technology has given us an exit ramp from the news helicopter—the drone.
Drones can now provide nearly all the aerial images we need for news. For the cost of about a thousand dollars each and some dedicated training of FAA-certified pilots, literally every journalist in your newsroom can become a remote pilot to capture aerial footage. Once equipped and trained, the monetary cost for using a drone for news coverage is next to zero, merely the cost of charging the batteries and replacing the propellers from time to time. And there’s really no risk of any human cost. The small drones used for news coverage are unlikely to cause serious injury or death—even if used improperly. Their biggest risk is collision with aircraft carrying passengers, something that no professional drone journalist has ever done.
Can drones do everything a helicopter can do?
No, but what we would lose in a switch from helicopters to drones are features we can mostly do without. I’m an FAA-certified drone pilot myself, so I know of which I speak:
-Drones are limited to flying 400 feet above ground level (or 400 feet above the highest structures to which they are near). News helicopters routinely operate between 500 and 3000 feet and can go much higher. But there’s seldom a need to be higher than 400 feet with a drone. The view is quite broad when taken to that altitude and drone cameras operate better closer to the surface anyway.
-Drones have limited battery life, typically limiting individual flights to about 30 minutes or so. Helicopters can fly about six times as long on one tank of fuel, though they seldom need to be up in the air for that duration. And drone pilots can land, change batteries and get back in the air very quickly, while helicopters must return to an airport to refuel.
-Drones do not fly very fast. Most top out around 20 miles an hour or so. Helicopters can fly much faster, typically cruising at 125 miles per hour. But most news stories require us to stay in one place circling. A drone can do that just as well—if not better than—a helicopter.
-Drones cannot carry passengers. Helicopters can be a quick method of getting journalists from point A to point B. This is one thing drones will not likely do for some time, leaving us to travel in our cars and obey the speed limits getting to a story.
-Drones cannot fly in some areas, like near airports, but helicopters are under most of the same FAA restrictions. Some municipalities have limited drone use or charge to fly drones to shoot video, but news organizations could work with those communities to get journalism exceptions—something those community leaders should see as increasing safety by limiting helicopter time over their areas.
The location of the most recent fatal crash, Los Angeles, is ironic considering my call to end the use of news helicopters. It was the birthplace of the news helicopter (or “telecopter,” as pioneering station KTLA called it) back in 1958. LA was the location of the three iconic stories I mentioned at the beginning of this piece. And it’s the perennial location of the one type of coverage that would go away if we made a total switch from helicopters to drones—the freeway car chase. While these spectacles draw viewers in with the built-in suspense of seeing how they will end, they offer little news value and take up newsgathering resources that would better be spent elsewhere. Losing aerial coverage of car chases will be a small price to pay for saving journalist lives.
I mentioned all the thrills and near misses I experienced while shooting from WESH’s helicopter. But I didn’t mention that it eventually crashed. The chopper went down from mechanical failure and pilot error covering a train derailment near Lakeland, Florida in 1994. Luckily, the photographer (who was someone I had worked with) and the pilot survived, though both had significant injuries. I know now that could have been me and that I was lucky my close calls didn’t end in something tragic like we saw in Los Angeles last week.
Let’s end these tragedies and hangar the helicopters for good.
The Last Editor by Stacey Woelfel is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
Paul Greeley is the manager and a writer for News Blues.
- Guest Commentary
September 24, 2026It’s Time to Retire the Rotors, the TV Helicopter has Outlived Its Usefulness
By Paul Greeley
NOTE: This is from Stacey Woelfel’s Substack column, The Last Editor by Stacey Woelfel.
Stacey Woelfel spent 35 years on the faculty of the Missouri School of Journalism.
And for 24 years, he was the news director for KOMU, the University of Missouri-owned NBC affiliate for central Missouri.
“I’ve been a professional journalist since 1981, a college-level educator since 1986 and someone with an opinion I always think someone else wants to hear since 1959.
These are my reflections, musings and rants on the state of journalism today.”
News Blues has posted many of Woelfel’s Substack columns over the past few years.
It’s Time to Retire the Rotors
Like much other technology used in TV news, the helicopter has outlived its usefulness
By Stacey Woelfel
I love to fly. I still remember my first time on a commercial aircraft—nearly 60 years ago—flying with my mother and brother from our home in St. Louis to Los Angeles to visit my father, who was on an extended work assignment there. For the longest time, I could count and remember every time I flew on an airplane (there are far too many now for me to count that anymore).
When I went to work in Florida right after college, I got to fly in an open cockpit biplane, and old Ford Trimotor and the Goodyear blimp.
But the best part of flying while working at WESH-TV was our helicopter.
It was the early 1980s, and helicopters were plentiful in TV news. All three stations doing news in Orlando at that time had their own helicopters, emblazoned with station logos and seen regularly in station promos.
As a 21-year-old photographer just starting my professional career, I was thrilled I’d be able to fly in the helicopter. Most of the other photographers had lost the thrill when it came to flying—or were just plain uncomfortable with it—so a lot of the flying stories fell to me.
The shooting set-up will seem crazy by modern standards.
This is long before bottom-mounted remote cameras with cabin controls inside the helicopter became the norm.
For me to shoot from the chopper, the pilot and I (there was usually no room for a reporter based on weight restrictions) would fly to the location where we wanted to shoot, land and take off the right side door and leave it somewhere safe.
Then I would sit on the floor of the chopper, pull the closest seatbelt out as long as it would go, duct tape the buckle so it didn’t accidentally come undone and then put my feet on the starboard skid and lean out the door to shoot my video. I wish I had a picture of me doing this, but I don’t. So here’s a picture of someone else shooting in pretty much the same way (except I didn’t have the harness he is wearing or the footrest he’s using—I had to put my feet on the actual skid).
This may seem crazy to look at and imagine me leaning out the side of a helicopter to get my video, but I loved it. I was in my early 20s and thought I was invincible. We had some close calls, like my distracted pilot almost running into a radio tower, getting caught in a thunderstorm with the door off (think convertible in a carwash) or taking an illegal, high-speed flight out over the Atlantic Ocean with the skids brushing against the waves. All those risks seem crazy to me now, as does the general notion of using helicopters to collect news footage. The tragic crash in Los Angeles last week is a reminder that these craft are dangerous or even deadly—to their occupants and people on the ground. It’s clear to me it’s time to retire the rotors and ground news helicopters.
I say this with all due respect for the two journalists who lost their lives last week—as well as the person killed on the ground—and I hope it’s not too soon after that tragedy for me to make this argument. Fifty-plus years ago, the news helicopter was a game changer. It allowed news organizations to give viewers an overview of a breaking news scene, putting context to the story that might not be visible from the ground. Fixed wing airplanes could sometimes provide good aerial views, but the ability to circle a scene or hover in place was ideal for news coverage. Think of the aerial footage of truck driver Reginald Denny being pulled from his truck and beaten during the L.A. riots. Think of the aerial footage of houses ablaze in the Palisades Fire. Or think of the aerial footage of that lone white Bronco with O.J. Simpson inside making its way across the Los Angeles freeways. Those indelible and iconic images all came from news helicopters.
But those images come with some very dear costs.
Aside from the actual cost to news organizations to lease and operate their helicopters—some reporting puts that at $1 million per year or more—the human cost is much greater.
While we still mourn the lives lost in Los Angeles last week, the list of those killed in news helicopter accidents is probably longer than you think. Just in the last 20 years in the United States alone, these other fatal accidents have all occurred during news gathering operations:
-December 19, 2023: Two killed when Philadelphia station WPVI-TV’s helicopter crashed in New Jersey on its way back from a story on the Jersey Shore.
-September 16, 2017: One killed when Albuquerque station WRQE-TV’s helicopter crashed in New Mexico.
-March 18, 2014: Two killed as Seattle station KOMO-TV’s helicopter crashed while lifting off from the landing pad at the station, horrifyingly seen by colleagues there at the TV station.
-October 13, 2008: Two killed when Houston station KTRK’s helicopter crashed while traveling to the scene of a shooting in rural Montgomery County, Texas.
-July 27, 2007: Four killed when the two helicopters from Phoenix stations KNXV-TV and KTVK collided with each other while covering a car chase that had five news helicopters in pursuit at one time.
That Phoenix crash not only had the greatest loss of life but also showed some of the most severe dangers in the system, with too many helicopters in the air, not enough space between them and pilots distracted by handling reporting duties on top of flying the aircraft. And we suffered that loss of life for what? A car chase? Even more than 19 years later, that crash and all that have come since—taking 13 lives and injuring 11 others in the U.S. alone—should be for something more than covering car chases.
Technology has given us an exit ramp from the news helicopter—the drone.
Drones can now provide nearly all the aerial images we need for news. For the cost of about a thousand dollars each and some dedicated training of FAA-certified pilots, literally every journalist in your newsroom can become a remote pilot to capture aerial footage. Once equipped and trained, the monetary cost for using a drone for news coverage is next to zero, merely the cost of charging the batteries and replacing the propellers from time to time. And there’s really no risk of any human cost. The small drones used for news coverage are unlikely to cause serious injury or death—even if used improperly. Their biggest risk is collision with aircraft carrying passengers, something that no professional drone journalist has ever done.
Can drones do everything a helicopter can do?
No, but what we would lose in a switch from helicopters to drones are features we can mostly do without. I’m an FAA-certified drone pilot myself, so I know of which I speak:
-Drones are limited to flying 400 feet above ground level (or 400 feet above the highest structures to which they are near). News helicopters routinely operate between 500 and 3000 feet and can go much higher. But there’s seldom a need to be higher than 400 feet with a drone. The view is quite broad when taken to that altitude and drone cameras operate better closer to the surface anyway.
-Drones have limited battery life, typically limiting individual flights to about 30 minutes or so. Helicopters can fly about six times as long on one tank of fuel, though they seldom need to be up in the air for that duration. And drone pilots can land, change batteries and get back in the air very quickly, while helicopters must return to an airport to refuel.
-Drones do not fly very fast. Most top out around 20 miles an hour or so. Helicopters can fly much faster, typically cruising at 125 miles per hour. But most news stories require us to stay in one place circling. A drone can do that just as well—if not better than—a helicopter.
-Drones cannot carry passengers. Helicopters can be a quick method of getting journalists from point A to point B. This is one thing drones will not likely do for some time, leaving us to travel in our cars and obey the speed limits getting to a story.
-Drones cannot fly in some areas, like near airports, but helicopters are under most of the same FAA restrictions. Some municipalities have limited drone use or charge to fly drones to shoot video, but news organizations could work with those communities to get journalism exceptions—something those community leaders should see as increasing safety by limiting helicopter time over their areas.
The location of the most recent fatal crash, Los Angeles, is ironic considering my call to end the use of news helicopters. It was the birthplace of the news helicopter (or “telecopter,” as pioneering station KTLA called it) back in 1958. LA was the location of the three iconic stories I mentioned at the beginning of this piece. And it’s the perennial location of the one type of coverage that would go away if we made a total switch from helicopters to drones—the freeway car chase. While these spectacles draw viewers in with the built-in suspense of seeing how they will end, they offer little news value and take up newsgathering resources that would better be spent elsewhere. Losing aerial coverage of car chases will be a small price to pay for saving journalist lives.
I mentioned all the thrills and near misses I experienced while shooting from WESH’s helicopter. But I didn’t mention that it eventually crashed. The chopper went down from mechanical failure and pilot error covering a train derailment near Lakeland, Florida in 1994. Luckily, the photographer (who was someone I had worked with) and the pilot survived, though both had significant injuries. I know now that could have been me and that I was lucky my close calls didn’t end in something tragic like we saw in Los Angeles last week.
Let’s end these tragedies and hangar the helicopters for good.
The Last Editor by Stacey Woelfel is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
He can be reached at Paul@NewsBlues.com or 817-578-6324.
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