I was just looking at Youtube and a video came up in my feed. A video about flying Utah. I have spent quite a bit of time in Utah, I think it is a wonderful place to fly. However, in the intro for this video by the latest YouTube aviator Ethan O'rourke, I saw more than a couple FAR violations. I proceeded to watch a couple minutes of the video before I shut it off. They've got a Porter, a Helicopter, a polished 180 and some other planes, they proceed to Mineral Bottom. At Mineral, the girl states that her Dad is going to do a flyby.
Sure these people are out having fun, they are mostly young, and obviously have some cash at their disposal. Why are they making these videos, to show their children in 30 years what we USED to be able to do? Or is it to build up their ego with clicks and likes from people who will never fly, or visit those places? Some airplane people watch these videos and dream about being able to be as popular as the cool kids in the video, and I assume some of these YouTube people make money from the views.

I don't think most of these YouTube video producers have any concern for what these videos are doing. I love backcountry flying, its why I moved to Idaho, its normal to want to share that with others, but sharing is different from exploiting. A couple years ago Scalewings, the company that builds composite p-51 replicas had a video shot at Mineral Bottom. Low passes over excited bystanders, shit thats's cool, until someone at the FAA says holy 91.119! What about the environmentalists floating the river or camping nearby? There has been a pretty coordinated effort by some groups to close these airstrips, doing commercial advertising while violating the FAR's and being a piss poor steward of our backcountry airstrips is a great way to give them credibility.

Utah has some wonderful flying, obviously so does Idaho. The ability to use those strips 20 years from now is NOT a given. Take the Big Creek 4, they are closed and not likely to be ever legally used again. I used to live in Colorado, where one group or another was always trying to promote Western Colorado, most often skiing but also mountain biking. After a magazine or two latched on to Carbondale Colorado as a great place to live and ride mountain bikes and ski, the quality of the experience dropped noticeably. That area sucks now, at least if you want to experience the outdoors without hundreds of your closest friends joining you. Full parking lots, trash, abused infrastructure, lack of wildlife, traffic, normal even on weekdays in the off season. With overuse, comes trash, crappy behavior, and an overall disrepect for the resource.

I've seen that weather stations are being set up at backcountry strips in Utah, the RAF is building fire pits, toilets, club houses, and such at some private "backcountry" strips. Backcountry is not so much backcountry when there is WIFI, showers, courtesy cars, cabins, and such, I've been to many municipal airports more backcountry than Johnson Creek, they just happen to have paved runways.

Specifically to the YouTube crowd: Stop doing stupid stuff like high speed passes with no intent to land, stop buzzing all your friends on the cliff, stop strip bagging. Please stop promoting backcountry Utah and Idaho as places for gaggles of planes to ruin the experience for other pilots and other users of our public lands. Not everyone enjoys airplane noise, from my experience those that don't, like to make their own noise to people that make rules and laws.

Finally, Get off my lawn!

Yes, my thoughts also. I was fed the same YouTube video. This young group rarely considers the negative effects of the power and responsibility of this new form of communication and media. I’ve seen too many places ruined permanently and not just aviation but outdoor recreation in general (dirt bikes are my main addiction). None as drastic a change as what’s happened to Idaho, Utah since Covid. How can they be educated to cause and effect?

You're missing the point.....this is the "Me Generation". They don't CARE about airstrips, backcountry, etc. All they care about is "Look at ME"

MTV

I also create YouTube videos, but my channel isn't monetized, and I rarely get even 1,000 clicks. That's OK since I primarily make videos to share my activities with close friends and family. They aren't wowed by egregious breaches of backcountry etiquette or the FARs, they just want to see where I've flown and what I saw while there. Some friends might choose to visit a couple of the places I fly, most won't. Most of my flying friends are still into the technical aspects of high speed cross country, or IFR flying. I've done that and both seem more like work than entertainment. I'm way past the point of flying for anything other than the simple pleasure of being airborne and seeing the world from a different perspective. In that regard, most of my flying isn't backcountry either. Grass strips in the backcountry are a strong attraction, but they're only available to me in the summer. The rest of the year I'm just poking around to see the snow capped mountains that surround the area I live in (the Pacific Northwest) and to grab an occasional meal. Pretty basic stuff, but I feel incredibly lucky to have that basic stuff as part of my life. I just hope the "look at me" crowd doesn't cause restrictions that take away some of the pleasure flying I can do now. Between the "professional" videographers and folks wanting to target "uber rich" pilots with luxury taxes and other negative incentives I don't know how much longer flying low and slow will be part of my life, but I do know I'm going to enjoy it responsibly as long as I can.

Flyhound wrote:folks wanting to target "uber rich" pilots with luxury taxes

A tax friendlier state might be in your future?

It’s been a fair bit of time since I visited BCP but I was lured back by the promise of an inspiring trip report (well done CAVU) and decided to take a gander at the current forum topics.

Interesting choice to promote a forum trip report to Alaska, yet deride a video of someone’s trip to Utah.

Don’t look too closely but there are elements of strip bagging in both. “Rich guys” out having fun. Yep. Pointless burning of avgas for no other purpose than to explore off the beaten path places for your own enjoyment and derive inspiration from this beautiful country we live in. All there.

What exactly was their primary sin? Low pass. Dumb to video, but I doubt there are many pilots on this forum that haven’t done one. Or was the real sin enjoying and sharing some place you’d rather no one know about so you can keep it for yourself? If that’s your goal maybe think about telling Galen Hanselmans son to stop publishing Fly ID and Fly UT. Give those people at UT backcountry pilots .org a talking to about publishing all those coordinates to uncharted strips. Better give Zzzz a keyboard lashing too for publishing all those off airport coordinates around the old high Sierra fly-in when he was providing inspiration to so many pilots, myself included, (through a well shot and edited video) to check out that event.

There is virtually no reason to fly the “backcountry” of UT other than the pure enjoyment of witnessing its beauty. There’s effectively no fishing or hunting to do and the camping at 90% of the airstrips provides no water source or shade, yet the collective “we” are fighting to keep them open. Why?

The line between use, abuse, and egregious behavior of backcountry locations lies in the eyes of the beholder. In Idaho every spring you will witness strip bagging from 135 pilots as they get checked off on airstrips, and right in front of the forest service who turn around and use their air taxi services. If you visit from out of state once a year and want to take a graduated approach to building understanding of high density altitude by progressing through more difficult spots and visiting more than one strip a day you are committing an egregious sin. Don’t get me started on the transgressions of Lori at McCall Mountain Flying for providing “gasp” instruction in the backcountry and wilderness areas.

If you’re triggered by videos of people enjoying your place it might be time to remember it’s not yours, it’s ours. Public land. You might take offense to the way people use it but that’s life, not everyone sees things the same way. You want a real threat, check out Utah’s Mike Lee who is wants to sell ofc our public lands. As for violations, let the FAA handle that. I wouldn’t waste my time hanging out at the local airport and monitoring the activity for 100% strict FAR compliance. You’ll likely be disappointed The FAA will be just fine without your watchful eye.

In the end this is a group of young men inspired by aviation and film that took a trip out to the virtually uninhabitable public lands of UT in November to record a bunch of mostly middle age men playing with their expensive toys in the desert. Does it promote an area some people would rather be kept a secret? Yes, but trust me, if you head there in the spring you’ll find the off-road community already found it….back in the 70s.

I’ve enjoyed and been inspired by videos from Zane and Greg Miller and Loni and many others throughout the years. I don’t need to mimic everything they do and I don’t “blame” them for ruining backcountry flying by making it popular or entertaining.

There’s a bunch of people out there enjoying aviation, some enjoy filming and sharing it some don’t. The YouTubers appreciate your views. Don’t forget to like and subscribe.

WA_L16 wrote:It’s been a fair bit of time since I visited BCP but I was lured back by the promise of an inspiring trip report (well done CAVU) and decided to take a gander at the current forum topics.

Interesting choice to promote a forum trip report to Alaska, yet deride a video of someone’s trip to Utah.

Don’t look too closely but there are elements of strip bagging in both. “Rich guys” out having fun. Yep. Pointless burning of avgas for no other purpose than to explore off the beaten path places for your own enjoyment and derive inspiration from this beautiful country we live in. All there.

What exactly was their primary sin? Low pass. Dumb to video, but I doubt there are many pilots on this forum that haven’t done one. Or was the real sin enjoying and sharing some place you’d rather no one know about so you can keep it for yourself? If that’s your goal maybe think about telling Galen Hanselmans son to stop publishing Fly ID and Fly UT. Give those people at UT backcountry pilots .org a talking to about publishing all those coordinates to uncharted strips. Better give Zzzz a keyboard lashing too for publishing all those off airport coordinates around the old high Sierra fly-in when he was providing inspiration to so many pilots, myself included, (through a well shot and edited video) to check out that event.

There is virtually no reason to fly the “backcountry” of UT other than the pure enjoyment of witnessing its beauty. There’s effectively no fishing or hunting to do and the camping at 90% of the airstrips provides no water source or shade, yet the collective “we” are fighting to keep them open. Why?

The line between use, abuse, and egregious behavior of backcountry locations lies in the eyes of the beholder. In Idaho every spring you will witness strip bagging from 135 pilots as they get checked off on airstrips, and right in front of the forest service who turn around and use their air taxi services. If you visit from out of state once a year and want to take a graduated approach to building understanding of high density altitude by progressing through more difficult spots and visiting more than one strip a day you are committing an egregious sin. Don’t get me started on the transgressions of Lori at McCall Mountain Flying for providing “gasp” instruction in the backcountry and wilderness areas.

If you’re triggered by videos of people enjoying your place it might be time to remember it’s not yours, it’s ours. Public land. You might take offense to the way people use it but that’s life, not everyone sees things the same way. You want a real threat, check out Utah’s Mike Lee who is wants to sell ofc our public lands. As for violations, let the FAA handle that. I wouldn’t waste my time hanging out at the local airport and monitoring the activity for 100% strict FAR compliance. You’ll likely be disappointed The FAA will be just fine without your watchful eye.

In the end this is a group of young men inspired by aviation and film that took a trip out to the virtually uninhabitable public lands of UT in November to record a bunch of mostly middle age men playing with their expensive toys in the desert. Does it promote an area some people would rather be kept a secret? Yes, but trust me, if you head there in the spring you’ll find the off-road community already found it….back in the 70s.

I’ve enjoyed and been inspired by videos from Zane and Greg Miller and Loni and many others throughout the years. I don’t need to mimic everything they do and I don’t “blame” them for ruining backcountry flying by making it popular or entertaining.

There’s a bunch of people out there enjoying aviation, some enjoy filming and sharing it some don’t. The YouTubers appreciate your views. Don’t forget to like and subscribe.

You make some very legitimate points, and I totally agree that there's a very fine line and a lot of individual interpretation between "egregious behavior", and enjoying the resource.

I don't condemn anyone for enjoying the resource, I worked in the world of resource protection for 34 years, and I've seen a lot of both egregious and legitimate enjoyment. My filter is pretty liberal, actually, I really like to see pilots sharpening their skills in places where landing long can be a disaster, for example, as long as it's done carefully, and with proper preparation.

But, YouTubers are out for clicks/likes, etc....and the smart ones are making $$$ at it. That, both the conservation agencies and I agree is probably illegal. Enforceable is a very different concept, however, and I hope the agencies don't ever have to go there.

Now, let's say a few pilots are approached by some YouTubers, to go out into the backcountry (whatever that is), do a bunch of flying around strip bagging, etc. Done safely, and not pissing anyone else at those strips.....why not? a) Those pilots have just committed a commercial operation, by definition. ANYthing bad happens, what do you suppose their insurance company will say when a claim is filed by one of the YouTubers against the pilot and his plane?

Let's put that into a different context: I arrive at Johnson Creek, and there's a couple there who want a ride to Salmon, say. I'm heading that way anyhow, so I say sure, but I'll need a little cash, more than the cost of the gas..... That would require a Part 135 certificate, actually. I could do that a dozen times and the FAA would be none the wiser, but if there's an insurance claim???

There is so much garbage out there on the interweb these days, and I look at some of it, occasionally. Most of those things don't wind my watch.

And, finally, after nearly 30 years flying commercially in Alaska, I never heard ANYone use the term "strip bagging". Shit, there are so many legal places to land up there that nobody cares. Unless of course, you land and fish my favorite gravel bar.....but that's not strip bagging, that's enjoying the bounties of that Great Land. I can remember camping a weekend at the McCarthy strip once, and having to go tell the air taxi guys NOT to keep their engines at idle till they got well past my tent on takeoff.....they were that polite, trying to avoid giving my tent a dust bath, it's an Alaska thing, sorta-till it's not.

I thoroughly enjoyed the recent TR, brought back a lot of memories for me. I haven't had the pleasure of exploring Utah as yet, but I may just put that on my radar. Someone else wants to join up, they're welcome in my world. But, low passes for shits and grins, with people on the strip.... bad idea on a lot of fronts. This from a guy who flew a couple thousand hours below (sometimes well below) 500 feet looking at and searching for stuff. And, you better believe I made sure to be far enough away from people places and things to keep the FAA off my arse.

WA_L16 wrote:Interesting choice to promote a forum trip report to Alaska, yet deride a video of someone’s trip to Utah.

Discussions, they are....diverse.

WA_L16 wrote:It’s been a fair bit of time since I visited BCP but I was lured back by the promise of an inspiring trip report (well done CAVU) and decided to take a gander at the current forum topics.

Interesting choice to promote a forum trip report to Alaska, yet deride a video of someone’s trip to Utah.

Don’t look too closely but there are elements of strip bagging in both. “Rich guys” out having fun. Yep. Pointless burning of avgas for no other purpose than to explore off the beaten path places for your own enjoyment and derive inspiration from this beautiful country we live in. All there.

What exactly was their primary sin? Low pass. Dumb to video, but I doubt there are many pilots on this forum that haven’t done one. Or was the real sin enjoying and sharing some place you’d rather no one know about so you can keep it for yourself? If that’s your goal maybe think about telling Galen Hanselmans son to stop publishing Fly ID and Fly UT. Give those people at UT backcountry pilots .org a talking to about publishing all those coordinates to uncharted strips. Better give Zzzz a keyboard lashing too for publishing all those off airport coordinates around the old high Sierra fly-in when he was providing inspiration to so many pilots, myself included, (through a well shot and edited video) to check out that event.

There is virtually no reason to fly the “backcountry” of UT other than the pure enjoyment of witnessing its beauty. There’s effectively no fishing or hunting to do and the camping at 90% of the airstrips provides no water source or shade, yet the collective “we” are fighting to keep them open. Why?

The line between use, abuse, and egregious behavior of backcountry locations lies in the eyes of the beholder. In Idaho every spring you will witness strip bagging from 135 pilots as they get checked off on airstrips, and right in front of the forest service who turn around and use their air taxi services. If you visit from out of state once a year and want to take a graduated approach to building understanding of high density altitude by progressing through more difficult spots and visiting more than one strip a day you are committing an egregious sin. Don’t get me started on the transgressions of Lori at McCall Mountain Flying for providing “gasp” instruction in the backcountry and wilderness areas.

If you’re triggered by videos of people enjoying your place it might be time to remember it’s not yours, it’s ours. Public land. You might take offense to the way people use it but that’s life, not everyone sees things the same way. You want a real threat, check out Utah’s Mike Lee who is wants to sell ofc our public lands. As for violations, let the FAA handle that. I wouldn’t waste my time hanging out at the local airport and monitoring the activity for 100% strict FAR compliance. You’ll likely be disappointed The FAA will be just fine without your watchful eye.

In the end this is a group of young men inspired by aviation and film that took a trip out to the virtually uninhabitable public lands of UT in November to record a bunch of mostly middle age men playing with their expensive toys in the desert. Does it promote an area some people would rather be kept a secret? Yes, but trust me, if you head there in the spring you’ll find the off-road community already found it….back in the 70s.

I’ve enjoyed and been inspired by videos from Zane and Greg Miller and Loni and many others throughout the years. I don’t need to mimic everything they do and I don’t “blame” them for ruining backcountry flying by making it popular or entertaining.

There’s a bunch of people out there enjoying aviation, some enjoy filming and sharing it some don’t. The YouTubers appreciate your views. Don’t forget to like and subscribe.

Boy, seems like I struck a nerve. Sounds like you might need to relax a little bit. I suspect it is projection but maybe not, you come across as if you have some insight into my mind as to how and why I posted what I did. No where did I even remotely suggest that I owned the backcountry. Perhaps go back and read it again, without your political bent skewing your comprehension.

What was their sin? It was not them using and filming at a spot I would "rather them not know about so you can keep it for yourself", it was them acting like a bunch of asshats doing EXACLTY what gets complaints from non-pilots. None of these Utah or Idaho strips are secret, unknown, or otherwise hard to find, they are on the F'ing chart, and there are plenty of videos already out there showing people coming and going. Pilots behaving in a manner that shows they don't give two F's about anyone else is how these strips are going get closed. Have you ever been to Mineral Bottom? do you know where it is? Its not actually not even called Mineral bottom anymore. Its on the Green River, it is at a rafting put in/ take out, it is a BLM recreation site. People are camping there, loading and unloading boats. I am also a rafter, and from my experience most rafters are big time environmentalists that hate everything about what we do, from burning leaded fuel, to making a noise they don't like. So, you do you, find a group of people that already don't like planes, pilots, motorized use of anything, or landing strips anywhere outside of an airport, and do some burnouts in your side by side around their camp fire, or do the equivalent in your airplane and buzz their camp on the river as the sun sets.

As for people getting instruction in the backcountry, perhaps part of that instruction might be to behave in a proper manner. Is there some reason people need to get instruction at the most well used high traffic strips in Idaho? They can't instruct at a municipal airport until someone has it figured out, then go "practice" at some back country strip that doesn't have much traffic, or is not along the Wild and Scenic river corridor? Sure, they could, but then Lori's school probably couldn't charge $10k or whatever it is. There are plenty of private strips in IDaho, perhaps they could pay the owners to practice there? Alaska and the rest are two completely different things, the few uncharted strips I went into in Alaska are used so little that they are verging on over grown. Hardly the case with EVERY strip in Idaho. In reference to the video that precipitated my post, I can't think of any strip in Utah that would be worse for asshat behavior than Mineral.

Some might say I'm Chicken Little, the sky is falling, the sky is falling. The fact is there are many groups out there that do not like recreational flying of any kind, let alone in a wilderness area. The Big Creek Four are shut down, The Utah Backcountry Pilots Association with assistance from other groups has done a great job of keeping Utah strips open. But, in Utah there are many strips that are already closed. I think its American Whitewater that has a special number for rafters to call to turn in people flying low up the Colorado RIver landing on gravel bars.

All of use here like to fly the backcountry, for some its gravel bars, others its Johnson Creek, I am all for people using what we have, and enjoying the freedom this great country has to offer. Just do it safely and with respect for other users, both aviation users and non-aviation users.

StillLearning wrote:..... and with respect for other users, both aviation users and non-aviation users.

^^^^^ ....THIS....^^^^^

With my my current debt load I pretty much live in an airplane, I love all things that fly (almost) I love burning fossils, and I love most everything 'backcountry'...... If you think that's a lot of I, I, I's... you got it right. But I also realize there's a 'You' and nothing about I trumps that, so I need to do my best to make sure that when I'm doing my jam, it's not at the expense of You're feel goods. even if we're worlds apart in mindsets.

I am of the opinion that aviators of any flavor should have enough couth to get this, all else are douche bags, that will drive another nail in the coffin of what most of us love doing.

Take care,
Rob

skyward II wrote:A tax friendlier state might be in your future?

WA state has no income tax and so far the annual state registration for my Maule is a minimal cost. I don't see any future airplane purchases in my life, so the high sales tax isn't a big concern. We have a house with a view of the salt water with a snow capped volcano in the background, so no moves are anticipated. This place isn't perfect, but it scratches more itches than any other place I've lived and I've been lucky enough to live and travel over most of the northern hemisphere.

here's the view from my front porch:


And there is some great side and back country flying in the area during the summer. Our home is in the "rain shadow" of the Olympic Mountains, so we only get 19" of rain a year compared to areas just 30 miles south of our home that see almost 57"/year, or deep in the heart of the Olympic National Park's temperate rain forest that gets as much as 170"/year. All of that moisture around us keeps the area green without ruining our day at home. When summer rolls around I have access to grass strips up in the Cascade Mountains as close as a 20 minute flight from home. Here's a video of flying into the Skykomish strip that gave me a taste of the mountains, but had me home for lunch:

I guess I don't understand the issue here. I would agree that filming low flyby's is in poor taste, but everything else I saw seemed like a group of friends having fun in their airplanes together. most of the flying looked like low altitude over non-populated areas to me. I've never understood the argument against "strip bagging". Is there a limited number of strips that should be allowed over a certain amount of time? Once a guy lands his airplane should he stay on the ground for a certain amount of time? I think as long as everything is done in a safe manner, with the most respect towards the non-pilot population enjoying the backcountry, where is the harm? This is Backcountrypilot.org by the way.

I think a couple other things to consider here: this video was posted with a quick shots making it appear way more chaotic than I would assume it was. I'm not an apologist for these guys, but behind the scenes I would assume that there was more planning going on than what they showed, just no one wants to watch all that "boring stuff".

One thing I think we should all remember, The non-pilot population vastly outnumbers the general aviation population. If we want to keep our hobby/ way we make money alive we need their continued support. I think videos showing friends having fun together may appeal to the general population even if they are not pilots themselves.

Flyhound wrote:

skyward II wrote:A tax friendlier state might be in your future?

WA state has no income tax .....

True....sort of.
Washington does have a capital gains tax now.
IMHO it is an income tax.
WA has tried to sugar-coat it as being "only for rich people",
kinda like the luxury tax on airplanes costing over 500K.
But I'm sure that eventually it will apply to all capital gains,
just like the luxury tax will someday apply to all personal aircraft.

hotrod180 wrote:

Flyhound wrote:

skyward II wrote:A tax friendlier state might be in your future?

WA state has no income tax .....

True....sort of.
Washington does have a capital gains tax now.
IMHO it is an income tax.
WA has tried to sugar-coat it as being "only for rich people",
kinda like the luxury tax on airplanes costing over 500K.
But I'm sure that eventually it will apply to all capital gains,
just like the luxury tax will someday apply to all personal aircraft.

Well, I have income every year that I pay no tax on. I also have long term investments that would be subject to the WA capital gains tax, but since my annual capital gains are less than $270K, the state gives me a get-out-of-jail-free card. So, right now, there is no income tax for me whether you consider capital gains income or not. If you have more than $270K of annual capital gains, it is hard to feel sorry for you even if you have to pay a nominal 7% tax on them. The intent of what I posted still stands. I get enough value out of living in this state to stay even if the sales tax is high. I don't see that changing in the number of years I have left. If it does, then I'll have to calculate if the effort to move would be worth whatever savings it generated. Right now, I don't see that happening, This really is a spectacular place to live and fly.

Flyhound wrote:

skyward II wrote:A tax friendlier state might be in your future?

WA state has no income tax and so far the annual state registration for my Maule is a minimal cost. I don't see any future airplane purchases in my life, so the high sales tax isn't a big concern. We have a house with a view of the salt water with a snow capped volcano in the background, so no moves are anticipated. This place isn't perfect, but it scratches more itches than any other place I've lived and I've been lucky enough to live and travel over most of the northern hemisphere.

here's the view from my front porch:


And there is some great side and back country flying in the area during the summer. Our home is in the "rain shadow" of the Olympic Mountains, so we only get 19" of rain a year compared to areas just 30 miles south of our home that see almost 57"/year, or deep in the heart of the Olympic National Park's temperate rain forest that gets as much as 170"/year. All of that moisture around us keeps the area green without ruining our day at home. When summer rolls around I have access to grass strips up in the Cascade Mountains as close as a 20 minute flight from home. Here's a video of flying into the Skykomish strip that gave me a taste of the mountains, but had me home for lunch:

I wouldn’t leave that either regardless of a states political environment. Beautiful…

User23 wrote:I guess I don't understand the issue here. I would agree that filming low flyby's is in poor taste, but everything else I saw seemed like a group of friends having fun in their airplanes together. most of the flying looked like low altitude over non-populated areas to me. I've never understood the argument against "strip bagging". Is there a limited number of strips that should be allowed over a certain amount of time? Once a guy lands his airplane should he stay on the ground for a certain amount of time? I think as long as everything is done in a safe manner, with the most respect towards the non-pilot population enjoying the backcountry, where is the harm? This is Backcountrypilot.org by the way.

I think a couple other things to consider here: this video was posted with a quick shots making it appear way more chaotic than I would assume it was. I'm not an apologist for these guys, but behind the scenes I would assume that there was more planning going on than what they showed, just no one wants to watch all that "boring stuff".

One thing I think we should all remember, The non-pilot population vastly outnumbers the general aviation population. If we want to keep our hobby/ way we make money alive we need their continued support. I think videos showing friends having fun together may appeal to the general population even if they are not pilots themselves.

I believe the issue (debate) is over motive for publishing the video…

Flyhound wrote:..... I also have long term investments that would be subject to the WA capital gains tax, but since my annual capital gains are less than $270K, the state gives me a get-out-of-jail-free card. So, right now, there is no income tax for me whether you consider capital gains income or not. If you have more than $270K of annual capital gains, it is hard to feel sorry for you even if you have to pay a nominal 7% tax on them. .....

I don't hit that plateau either, just like I've never bought a 500K airplane & triggered the luxury tax.
But IMHO those are just a start...
like the old expression about the camel getting his nose under the edge of the tent.

But like you, I enjoy living here in WA, and I don't think an income tax will be what makes me want to move.
More likely it would be the dreary winters.

skyward II wrote:

User23 wrote:I guess I don't understand the issue here. I would agree that filming low flyby's is in poor taste, but everything else I saw seemed like a group of friends having fun in their airplanes together. most of the flying looked like low altitude over non-populated areas to me. I've never understood the argument against "strip bagging". Is there a limited number of strips that should be allowed over a certain amount of time? Once a guy lands his airplane should he stay on the ground for a certain amount of time? I think as long as everything is done in a safe manner, with the most respect towards the non-pilot population enjoying the backcountry, where is the harm? This is Backcountrypilot.org by the way.

I think a couple other things to consider here: this video was posted with a quick shots making it appear way more chaotic than I would assume it was. I'm not an apologist for these guys, but behind the scenes I would assume that there was more planning going on than what they showed, just no one wants to watch all that "boring stuff".

One thing I think we should all remember, The non-pilot population vastly outnumbers the general aviation population. If we want to keep our hobby/ way we make money alive we need their continued support. I think videos showing friends having fun together may appeal to the general population even if they are not pilots themselves.

I believe the issue (debate) is over motive for publishing the video…

That is not the debate or issue.

The issue is doing things that are unnecessary, and sometimes illegal that show a lack of respect for the resource and the other users of the resource. Especially at airstrips and areas that are already under attack from groups that want to close the area or airstrip down. Just like poachers and road hunters make all hunters look bad, videos like many out there make us all look like disrespectful dicks.

User23 wrote:I guess I don't understand the issue here. I would agree that filming low flyby's is in poor taste, but everything else I saw seemed like a group of friends having fun in their airplanes together. most of the flying looked like low altitude over non-populated areas to me. I've never understood the argument against "strip bagging". Is there a limited number of strips that should be allowed over a certain amount of time? Once a guy lands his airplane should he stay on the ground for a certain amount of time? I think as long as everything is done in a safe manner, with the most respect towards the non-pilot population enjoying the backcountry, where is the harm? This is Backcountrypilot.org by the way.

I think a couple other things to consider here: this video was posted with a quick shots making it appear way more chaotic than I would assume it was. I'm not an apologist for these guys, but behind the scenes I would assume that there was more planning going on than what they showed, just no one wants to watch all that "boring stuff".

One thing I think we should all remember, The non-pilot population vastly outnumbers the general aviation population. If we want to keep our hobby/ way we make money alive we need their continued support. I think videos showing friends having fun together may appeal to the general population even if they are not pilots themselves.

I think the concept of strip bagging more or less originated in Idaho, where most backcountry strips lie along rivers or streams, many of which support a substantial business in river rafting/kayaking, whitewater and otherwise. You wind up with a lot of rafters, floating rivers, enjoying the "wilderness experience", interrupted by a flight of five low flying airplanes, flying down/up river to the next strip, where they each land, then takeoff without ever shutting down. Then maybe headed back the direction they came, toward the next canyon/strip, again flying over those same floaters. That will piss people off, especially when the overflights are low, whether within 500 feet or no, a flight of planes buzzing overhead at 502 feet while you are enjoying the solitude of your very expensive float trip is not going to be popular.

The point is, we have the RIGHT to play these games, but that right can be removed. Observe the Bob Marshall and Great Bear Wilderness, for example. There are a number of back country strips in those two wilderness complexes, but all but one is closed permanently. That probably didn't happen because of strip bagging, but it could happen in Idaho, if we piss off enough of the wrong people.

It's not too much to ask for pilots to a) Maintain a decent height while in transit between stops, b) Land, shut down, and get out and stretch your legs before you take off to your next destination. This shouldn't be a contest to see who can land the most airstrips in the Idaho or ??? area in one day.

The point is, we have the priviledge of using, flying over and landing in a LOT of back country in this US of A. But, if we are inconsiderate of other users..... Please don't take this to suggest that we should roll over to other users just because there are more of them. I think the State of Idaho Aeronautics Division is doing a great job of trying to find and support a balance between users, and I support their efforts.