AOPA seeks federal help releasing airplane seized by Minnesota tribe

AOPA President Darren Pleasance sent a letter to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum. The letter states that the pilot, Darrin Smedsmo, made an emergency landing “consistent with established aviation safety procedures and federal regulations" that "was undertaken solely to preserve life and property and was necessitated by mechanical failure, not by choice or negligence.”

The aircraft, a Stinson 108, was subsequently confiscated by the Red Lake Nation, which “has refused to permit its retrieval by the owner,” citing a 1978 tribal resolution that claims jurisdiction over airspace up to 20,000 feet, and bans overflights of “any airplanes.”

“This assertion raises serious concerns, as regulation of navigable airspace is a matter of exclusive federal authority and administered by the Federal Aviation Administration,” Pleasance wrote. “Moreover, a state highway—though it may traverse tribal land—remains a public right-of-way, and the emergency use of that roadway by an aircraft in distress is a permissible and lawful incident of aviation operations.”

In the letter, Pleasance said the incident raises broader aviation safety concerns and urged both federal departments to work together, and with the tribe, to ensure similar situations do not occur in the future.

“The continued detention of the aircraft not only imposes substantial financial harm on the owner but also sets a troubling precedent that could discourage pilots from making necessary emergency landings, thereby jeopardizing public safety,” Pleasance wrote.