Helicopter business in deadly NYC crash had faced debt lawsuits

NEW YORK — New York Helicopter has plied the skies around New York City landmarks for decades. But the company had some difficulties before one of its sightseeing choppers plummeted into the Hudson River this week, killing all six people aboard.

There was a close call in 2013, when another helicopter suddenly lost power in midair and the pilot maneuvered it to a safe landing on pontoons in the Hudson.

And in the last eight years, the company has been through a bankruptcy and faces ongoing lawsuits over alleged debts.

This January, it was sued for over $1.4 million by a company that claimed it wasn't being paid for a leased chopper.

A cash-advance lender sued in February, saying the helicopter firm had blocked repayments on a weeks-old loan and owed over $83,000. New York Helicopter hasn't yet filed a response in either case.

The business said in a statement Friday that it was profoundly saddened by the crash and referred any media inquiries to investigators.

''The safety and well-being of our passengers and crew has always been the cornerstone of our operations," the statement added.

A message seeking comment was left at owner Michael Roth's home, where someone who answered Thursday night told The Associated Press that Roth wasn't commenting. He had told the New York Post he was bewildered and devastated by the crash, while noting that helicopters, like any machines, can break.

Founded in the 1990s, Roth's business, which also has been known by names including New York Helicopter Charter Inc. and New York Helicopter Tours LLC, offers tourists a bird's-eye view of the Statue of Liberty, Central Park and the Manhattan skyline. One of few firms with a license allowing it to fly close to major New York City landmarks, it also offers shuttles to airports and charter flights for executives and others.

The airspace around Manhattan is busy, tricky and sometimes deadly. More than three dozen people have perished in tour and other helicopter crashes in New York City in the last half-century. Just weeks ago, a $90 million settlement ended a wrongful-death lawsuit filed by relatives of one of five passengers killed in a 2018 sightseeing-helicopter crash operated by a different company.

Mayor Eric Adams noted during TV interviews Friday that thousands of flights a year operate safely from the lower Manhattan heliport where Thursday's tour took off. Asked whether he had any specific concerns about New York Helicopter, he said only that investigators were looking into what happened.

The Democratic mayor told Fox 5/WNYW-TV he wouldn't seek to stop such flights: ''Air travel is crucial to this city."

New York Helicopter's website claims an ''industry-leading safety record,'' but it hasn't been entirely without dings. The National Transportation Safety Board attributed the 2013 power failure partly to an ''improper maintenance decision" about an oil pressure issue.

Two years later, a New York Helicopter craft went into a spin while hovering low off a helipad, landing hard but safely with just the pilot aboard. That time, the NTSB blamed an unknown person who had painted over a bad part — marked as such — on a chopper that New York Helicopter had recently leased from someone who had just bought it. The new owner advised that the part had arrived with fresh paint.

New York Helicopter hit financial trouble after New York City halved tour helicopter traffic in 2017, according to filings in the company's 2019 bankruptcy case.

As flights were cut down but Manhattan landing fees rose, the company saw revenue fall from $4.5 million in 2017 to $3.9 million in 2018, according to its bankruptcy papers. New York Helicopter said it slashed its staff from 30 employees to 13.

By 2019, it listed $6 million in assets and $1.6 million in liabilities, including hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt for landing fees and repair bills.

The business emerged from bankruptcy in 2022 but apparently continued to face financial headwinds.

Last June, the company filed a lawsuit over what it called an ''unconscionable'' loan it got in 2018 from another cash-advance lender. The helicopter company dropped the case this month. It is unclear from court records whether there was any financial or other settlement, and a lawyer who represented the company declined to comment.

___

Associated Press writer Michael R. Sisak contributed.