The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) sent a second letter to Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum and Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy, urging them to step in after a Minnesota pilot’s airplane was seized following an emergency landing on a state highway in the Red Lake Nation in Minnesota in October 2025.
The pilot, Darrin Smedsmo, was flying his Stinson 108 over Lower Red Lake while en route from Roseau, Minnesota, to Bemidji, Minnesota, on Oct. 15, 2025, when his engine suffered a catastrophic failure. As a result, he landed safely on State Highway 89, along the western edge of the lake.
The tribe seized the airplane, citing a 1978 tribal resolution that claims jurisdiction over airspace up to 20,000 feet and bans overflights of “any airplanes.”
In its first letter to Burgum and Duffy in December 2025, AOPA urged the agencies to intervene and pointed out that this “assertion raises serious concerns, as regulation of navigable airspace is a matter of exclusive federal authority and administered by the Federal Aviation Administration.”
In this week’s letter, AOPA Senior Vice President of Government Affairs and Advocacy Jim Coon reiterated that the federal government has “exclusive sovereignty” over airspace, and that regulations require “the pilot in command to take whatever action is necessary to protect life and property.”
Coon said the case has wider implications beyond seeking the return of Smedsmo’s airplane.
“The current situation involving Red Lake Nation raises significant concern within the general aviation community. If an emergency landing made in the interest of safety can be treated as trespassing and result in confiscation of an aircraft and substantial penalties, it creates uncertainty for pilots who may be forced by circumstances beyond their control to land wherever safety requires,” wrote Coon.
In a recent interview with a local PBS station, Smedsmo said the tribe asked for more than $7,000 to cover the towing fee and a donation to the Red Lake Nation Boys and Girls Club, which Smedsmo said, “wasn’t acceptable.”
“They obviously don’t have anything against me and so they’re just putting it off, putting it off, putting it off, hoping it’ll go away and I’m not planning on going anywhere,” added Smedsmo.
“The continued impoundment of an aircraft following a legitimate emergency landing raises serious questions about how federal aviation law and safety protections are being applied in this situation,” said Coon.
Without a resolution, Coon added that AOPA may pursue a “legislative remedy to clarify and reaffirm the protections afforded to pilots who are compelled to make emergency landings in the interest of safety.”
A legal defense fund has been set up to help fight the tribal’s regulatory overreach. You can find out more about it at ISueGov.com/Plane
For more information: AOPA.org
Where do you get your information? “Bought the Farm” comes from WW II when the family got their GI’s Life Insurance money ($5,000) from the government and paid off their mortgage. Many of the soldiers killed were raised on small family farms! Thus “bought the farm” became a euphemism for dying in combat.
Also, didn’t the Cowboys already defeat the Indians once?
IMHO, the Tribe is out of line on this. Basically they are demanding a “ransom” in order for the aircraft owner to get his aircraft back. That’s illegal and immoral in my book.
The phrase “bought the farm” literally meant if you crashed or even experienced an emergency landing, you were to purchase the land the aircraft set on. Last I read the tribe was only asking $8k as a donation toward their own welfare. What’s the plane worth … probably north of $30k. Just pay up and call it a good landing … while AOPA should be involved in bigger issues. Sorry to offend fellow pilots, but anyone living in this region knows how these indigenous people have been “treated,”
This isn’t about how these natives were “treated”. If you think this is justice, then remember that this pilot had literally nothing to do with how the natives were “treated”. This is The Red Nation Vs. The Federal Government in my opinion, and truly, the feds need to recognize it. The implications are considerably larger than a maltreated pilot getting his aircraft rightly returned.