The largest civilian helicopter school in the U.S. abruptly ceased operations on February 3 amidst allegations by students and former employees of skewed ethics, mismanagement, misrepresentation and possible criminal activities. Executives throughout the industry fear that the building scandal surrounding Silver State Helicopters and its founder, Jerry Airola, could taint the entire helicopter training industry, exacerbate a looming shortage of commercial helicopter pilots, and make it more difficult for students to obtain loans for helicopter pilot training.
“This is one big cesspool and there is definitely the potential for backlash,” said Randy Rowles, chairman of the HAI’s flight training committee. “This is going to create huge issues within the next 30 days.” Rowles joined Silver State in June last year to “clean up” its training program but had tendered his resignation before the bankruptcy. Rowles said he did so after the company resumed high-pressure marketing tactics that created “overcapacity problems” of too many students and not enough helicopters at the school’s 33 locations. Rowles estimated the overcapacity at 20 to 40 percent on average, depending on location. Two locations in Florida had 46-percent overcapacity, according to Rowles. Silver State operated 250 helicopters, most of them Robinson R22s.
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