Another complaint about night-flying over Dunedin has disappointed a local flying school instructor, who says the school is making every effort to limit disturbance to residents.
Julie Ann Moore, a South Dunedin resident, contacted the Otago Daily Times to express her frustration with night flights over South Dunedin on Tuesday and Thursday last week.
On Thursday, in particular, several small aircraft flew around the suburbs of St Clair, St Kilda and Musselburgh "in a circle for hours" until about 11pm, she said.
"Honestly, it drives you nuts," Ms Moore said.
"You can't go to sleep. It's like someone using a motor-mower at night, for hours on end."
What made the situation worse, she said, was that there was no-one to complain to about the noise.
Aircraft are exempt from air pollution regulations, and the CAA does not deal with noise complaints.
At the very least, some notification of when and where the flying was to take place, would help, she said.
The complaint follows an apology earlier this year from John Penno, of Mainland Aviation College, after some of the flying school's students had flown over the city until 2am some nights.
Mr Penno, who was away at the time, apologised after some residents complained.
But he said on Sunday he was now getting "a bit sick of" the complaining.
"We stuffed up once and we apologised for that and we are trying to make sure it [late night flying over the city] doesn't happen again."
He said "no way" would aircraft have been repeatedly circling parts of the city or flying over the area after 10pm.
He said as a result of the earlier complaints, and out of courtesy to residents, it was now policy that pilots did not fly over the city after 10pm, below 3000ft, or cover the same circuit repeatedly.
"We pay special attention to it now."
He said trainee pilots were told not to fly the same route repeatedly, and spread their night-flying training over the South, not just over Dunedin.
He earlier said night-flying over built-up areas was a necessary part of pilot training which could not be replicated in rural areas.
The flying school could not publicly notify when the night flights might happen because it was weather-dependent, he said
