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http://www.nj.com/jets/index.ssf/2015/08/nj-based_pilot_who_taunted_patriots_fans_with_bann.html
N.J.-based pilot who taunted Patriots with banner says he was evicted from airport
A banner towed by an airplane over the New England Patriots' practice field reads "Cheaters Look Up!" as it passes the lighting rack above Gillette Stadium during training camp in Foxborough, Mass., Thursday, July 30, 2015. (AP Photo | Charles Krupa)
By Kevin Manahan | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com Follow on Twitter
on August 04, 2015 at 9:15 PM, updated August 05, 2015 at 9:03 AM
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The New Jersey-based pilot who flew a banner over the New England Patriots' practice last week, mocking the team over Deflategate, said he was angrily kicked out of the local Massachusetts airport as soon he landed.
But Kelley Dinneen, president of King Aviation Mansfield, which manages the airport, said the request was made in jest, although she considered the taunting banner -- which read "Cheaters Look Up!" -- childish and a form of bullying.
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She added that whoever booked the time at the airport lied about the message Chalmers would be towing. Had she known, she said, she would have denied access to the airfield.
Chalmers, the owner of Jersey Shore Aerial Advertising, said he was paid by a group of New York Jets fans to tow the banner over Gillette Stadium on July 30 as the Patriots worked out.
After flying over the stadium, he landed his plane at Mansfield Municipal Airport and began to pack up the banner for the flight back to New Jersey. That's when a worker approached him and told him to get off the property immediately, Chalmers said.
"He said to me, 'Leave now, and don't come back,'" Chalmers told the Boston Globe. "I thought it was comical. I thought he was joking at first."
But "the guy was mad," Chalmers added.
Dinneen said Chalmers was asked to leave, but not "in a mean way." She said Chalmers had to make way for incoming flights. Still, she said, officials had a right to be angry because someone had lied about the banner.
"We asked him what he was towing. When it was asked, the person on the phone said it wouldn't be anything against the Patriots," she said. "It is a little annoying that we were lied to. If we knew what the banner was ahead of time, we would have said find another airport."
She called the banner — and the Jets fans who paid for it — childish.
Chalmers, while denying anyone lied, said he was only doing a job he was paid to do.
"I'm just an advertising company," he said. "I'm not a sports guy, so I don't really get it when people get so passionate and pissed off. I couldn't be any more neutral."
