Wisconsin Sheriff’s Office Responds To Bizarre Parking Call Involving Helicopter At A Store

I'll admit, I have to hand it to this guy for being hilariously blunt with his reason for using an abnormal means of transportation to go shopping.

The Washington County Sheriff's Office shared body camera video footage showing a deputy investigating an unexpected vehicle parked in the lot outside of the Cabela's northwest of Milwaukee in Richfield, Wisconsin, over the weekend.

Around 6 pm on Saturday (August 1), a report of a helicopter landing in the Cabela's parking lot came in.

Now, normally when an aircraft lands somewhere that isn't a designated runway or helipad, it's because of some emergency or unplanned circumstances. In the case of this story, it was very much planned.

The deputy responded to the scene around 6:20 pm on Saturday, making contact with the pilot, who was a 69-year-old man from Rosendale, WI.

In talking with the pilot about the abnormal parking call reported by someone, the man informed the deputy that he flew to Cabela's in the helicopter because "the drive was too long".

I mean, that's valid.

The drive, by the way, is about 50 miles from Rosendale to the Cabela's in Richfield. By air, it's about 40 miles (and probably a little faster than the highway speeds you'd be driving), so it is a time savings to travel by air.

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The deputy confirmed that the pilot is properly licensed, landed safely (in what looks like an empty area of the store's parking lot), and complied with all FAA regulations that would seem to apply to the situation.

That said, while it was certainly abnormal to see a helicopter land in the store parking lot, the sheriff's office says there were no violations or arrests. They just called it "a unique way to make a shopping trip".

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They're definitely not wrong. Where I grew up, it was at least a half-hour drive to get to the nearest big-box store or decently stocked grocery store, so I get this guy's idea.

If my family had a helicopter, I'd be pushing to use it to avoid the sizable round-trip drive to go get things from the store.