When Darrin Smedsmo was flying from Roseau, Minnesota, to Bemidji, Minnesota, on Oct. 15, 2025, his Stinson 108’s prop stopped spinning. He knew then that his 80-year-old Franklin engine was having a catastrophic failure.
At 3,500 feet AGL he was over Red Lake, so he began preparing for an emergency landing on State Highway 89.
Safely back on the ground, the relief he felt was short-lived.
That’s because three members of the Red Lake Nation Tribal Police showed up, informing Darrin that they had bad news for him: The tribe was seizing his airplane, saying he had violated the terms of Tribal Resolution 59-78, which states that the tribe has authority over the airspace up to 20,000 feet and bans overflights of “any airplanes.”
More than four months later, Darrin still doesn’t have his Stinson back and he finds himself in a fight he never wanted.
Two Fronts
The fight has two fronts. The first is Darrin’s fight to get his airplane back. The second is the fight to ensure this never happens again.
Fundraising has begun for that fight through the Five Stones Legal Defense Fund which, according to officials, aims to:
- Defend federal airspace authority, with the FAA taking precedence over any local laws.
- Clarify protocols for emergency landings, with officials noting the incident highlights the lack of clear, established protocols for emergency landings on tribal lands.
- Protect individual property rights: The seizure of a private citizen’s plane after an unavoidable, life-saving emergency represents a challenge to property rights.
- Challenge regulatory overreach: The Red Lake Nation cited a tribal resolution prohibiting aircraft from flying under 20,000 feet, which the pilot was cited for violating. The legal challenge will contest the enforceability of this decades-old, high-altitude restriction against general aviation in an emergency scenario.
- Permanent solution on emergency landings: A federal law must be passed authorizing private lawsuits against tribal officials when they seize airplanes after emergency landings on their reservations.
It is estimated it will cost about $200,000 for the legal fight. As of Jan. 26, 2026, just over $5,000 had been raised.
Darrin is handling the costs of his own fight which, so far, has cost him about $5,000.
He hired a local lawyer who is handling the case with the tribe. A scheduled Nov. 3, 2025, hearing was canceled, with no other date set. Darrin did hear from his lawyer that there have been recent developments that look good for him to get his airplane back, but as of mid-January 2026, he had not heard an update.
The Stinson is not stored in a hangar, according to Darrin. It is tied to two cars with a quarter-inch clothesline rope.
He doesn’t know if they will try to charge him storage fees, but they are already trying to get him to pay the more than $2,000 towing bill. He says that’s a non-starter.
“As far as I’m concerned, they have it illegally,” he said. “They have seized it illegally and they are holding it illegally.”
Darrin says he didn’t choose this fight.
“It chose me,” he said.
“The fight for my little Stinson is my deal,” he continued. “But the fight over the airspace is every pilot’s deal.”
The Second Front
Darrin is getting help on the bigger fight from the Minnesota Pilots Association and the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA).
AOPA lawyers have been participating in weekly calls trying to negotiate an end to the Stinson’s seizure.
While they can’t comment on those calls, they were able to comment on why Darrin’s situation is so important to every general aviation pilot.
“This is about protecting the integrity of our National Airspace System,” said Jared Allen, Deputy General Counsel for the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association. “When we allow state, local or tribal, in this case, airspace regulation, it threatens safety, it creates legal uncertainty, it restricts access and freedom of flight, and that’s for all aircraft operations.”
“It’s not just pilots who should be concerned about this — the entire community should be concerned. These attempts to fragment the airspace system delay emergency services like air ambulance operations, disrupts commerce, national defense, and every other way that aviation serves the public every day. That is our primary concern here.”
According to Allen, federal law is clear that the FAA has exclusive authority over our airspace.
“It’s clear from the federal statutes, it’s clear from case law, and it’s clear from the FAA materials,” he said.
However, the agency also has recognized the “limited right of state or local governments to regulate takeoff and landing of aircraft from the ground,” he noted.
But that limited right should not apply to inflight emergencies, he continued.
“A pilot must be able to deviate from the law to the extent necessary to meet that emergency,” he said. “And that’s the same standard that the FAA has when it comes to enforcing its own regulations. So we want to make it clear that should apply even in these kinds of specific situations involving tribal lands.”
That is why AOPA sent a letter to Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy and Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum asking their agencies to “come forward and help educate all involved here how airspace sovereignty works,” Allen said.
In the letter AOPA President Darren Pleasance noted that Darrin made an emergency landing “consistent with established aviation safety procedures and federal regulations… solely to preserve life and property and was necessitated by mechanical failure, not by choice or negligence.”
The letter added that the tribe’s 1978 resolution, which bans overflights of “any airplanes,” raises “serious concerns, as regulation of navigable airspace is a matter of exclusive federal authority and administered by the FAA.”
“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.”
Pleasance 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.
Meanwhile, officials with the Minnesota Pilots Association say they will be part of the planned lawsuit in federal court to clarify that only the FAA controls airspace in the United States.
“We have begun fundraising to cover the legal costs of this effort to fight the overstepping of the Red Lake tribe,” an official said, noting that this is not the first time a tribe has confiscated a general aviation aircraft. There was at least one other time in Minnesota, as well as once in Arizona.
“Given the fact that the FAA does not delineate tribal lands on our navigation charts we, as pilots, have no way of knowing where we are in terms of tribal lands below,” the official added.
How To Protect Yourself
How can a general aviation pilot protect themselves from a similar situation?
The first way is to not have an emergency landing in unfamiliar territory.
“No pilot wants to experience an emergency situation and we already take all actions we can to avoid them,” AOPA’s Allen said. “To some extent, you’re never going to be able to choose where exactly you’re going to need to have a forced landing. That being said, I think the best thing pilots can do at this point is to just get the best understanding of where these cases are currently and understand the risks.”
For instance, it’s common knowledge that the Red Lake Nation has asked its members to monitor flights over tribal lands and make reports using publicly available information.
“Pilots may want to consider some of the privacy programs that are offered by the FAA to protect your pilot registry and aircraft information,” he said.
That could be helpful in other situations, he added.
“We’re seeing a number of instances throughout the United States where private individuals who are claiming ownership of airspace above their house are using things like ADS-B data and registry records to create frivolous claims against aircraft operations,” he said.
That’s one reason AOPA is supporting the Pilot and Aircraft Privacy Act (PAPA), legislation introduced in 2025 by Rep. Bob Onder (R-Mo.) as H.R. 4146 and Sen. Ted Budd (R-N.C.) as S. 2175. If passed, the law would prohibit the use of ADS-B data to collect airport fees. It also would ban the government from using ADS-B information to initiate an enforcement action. Lastly, it would “clarify that ADS-B data may only be used for its intended purposes of air traffic safety and efficiency.”
Join The Fight
While Darrin believes that the FAA will ultimately “win the case for us,” the agency has not weighed in yet. One reason is that the emergency landing happened during the 2025 government shutdown.
He also realizes that he needs the entire general aviation community to help, adding he’s sure every pilot out there has opinions about what happened.
“But at this point, I’m humbly asking for more than just opinions,” he said.
Find out more about the fundraising effort at Isuegov.com/Plane
For more information: MnPilots.org, AOPA.org
If this airspace is going to be a problem, a notam or tfr needs to be set
Ridiculous! Our country is becoming more and more dysfunctional. I feel for the plane owner. He is in a terrible situation with little to no legal rights to get his plane back due to a situation that was out of his control. Like some of the other comments, cut off all funding to the tribe until the matter is resolved. Heck! Call the Trump Organization. They will gladly recover it for you. 🙂 Go one step further! Get the media involved. Get the story on national news.
Folks say: “Cut off Federal funding to the Tribe. In reality, almost all tribal income is now from tax-free sales and gambling in casinos. They probably wouldn’t miss what little federal funding, if any, they now receive .
Where’s Col. Custer when you need him? Oh, wait, that didn’t work out toowell…since tribal land is separate from U.S. law, it is like negotiating with a foreign country. I wish him luck.
You have to wonder if the tribe would look the other way to allow a hospital medivac helicopter from outside their lands to fly over and land to rescue a sick or injured resident, or if this has happened in the past.
The plane landed on a US highway. Technically that sounds like US property not tribal land.
Our federal government should cease all funding to this tribe until this matter is resolved.
And once again, our FAA fails to do their collective jobs.
Simplistic solution.
The tribe needs to apply to the FAA for prohibited airspace above their lands.
Is it noted on a sectional chart that the sky is restricted up to 20,000’? That’s crazy. I hope he gets his plane back.
This situation sounds incredibly stressful for Darrin Smedsmo. It’s shocking that after a successful emergency landing, the aircraft recovery itself became this complicated legal battle with the Tribe. I wonder what the specific jurisdictional issues are regarding an emergency landing on Tribal land versus navigable airspace jurisdiction?
Tribal land is separate nation status. Rules are the tribe’s to make or break. The treatment we get for the treatment they got.
State Hwy 89 is state land, not tribal. The picture shows the airplane sitting on a frontage road; that may not be state land.
I don’t understand why the tribe won’t give the plane back to the owner; their actions are foolish. What if the Feds told them that we’ll cease all tribal funding until this issue is resolved? Want to see how quickly he gets his plane back?