Outback Wrangler Matt Wright’s history of aviation breach investigations

Matt Wright says an expose of aviation investigations involving him and his company Helibrook dating back to 2011 are based on ‘rumours and false accusations’. Here’s what the FOI revealed.

Outback Wrangler Matt Wright has rejected what he claims are “rumours and false accusations” contained in an expose of his history of aviation safety investigations published by the Australian newspaper.

The report, published in the Weekend Australian on Saturday, details a history of investigations of Wright and his company Helibrook by the Civil Aviation Safety Authority.

Using heavily redacted CASA documents obtained under freedom of information laws, the newspaper revealed the regulator had investigated a string of incidents in the decade leading up to the fatal chopper crash that killed Chris “Willow” Wilson last year.

In response to questions put by this publication on Monday however, a spokesman for Wright said safety was and always had been “a priority for Matt and his team”.

“The continued reporting of rumours and false accusations, whether they be from a decade ago or recent, is misleading and inaccurate,” the spokesman said.

The CASA investigations date back to 2011 when the first series of Wright’s reality TV show Outback Wrangler aired, according to the report in The Australian.

After the first four episodes were broadcast, a member of the Territory’s crocodile management program “raised concerns” with CASA, the publication has reported the documents as showing.

Michael Burbidge and Matt Wright.

Investigators then alleged Wright and his co-star Michael Burbidge had possibly committed up to 14 safety breaches over a six-week period while filming in late 2010.

That assessment was based only on what CASA could see in the final cuts, according to the Australian.

The possible offences investigated involved five different choppers and included reckless operation of an aircraft, low flying, carrying firearms, carrying live animals, not wearing seatbelts, not restraining cargo, unapproved modifications and conducting commercial operations without an air operator’s certificate.

Two years later the NT News published a front-page photo of what was alleged to be someone shooting a crocodile from a helicopter Wright was flying.

A photo that appeared on the front page of the NT News in 2013 showing what was alleged to be someone shooting a crocodile from a helicopter piloted by Outback Wrangler Matt Wright.

The FOI documents show CASA did not investigate the incident in April 2013 but NT Parks and Wildlife did, according to the Australian.

A witness claimed shots were fired from the chopper as it hovered over the mouth of Shady Camp, an area known for its high density of crocs.

‘‘(I) spotted these guys about a kilometre away shooting a croc outside the river mouth, winching it up and flying to shore and land,” he told this publication at the time.

Wright, who said he was heli-fishing with a client, said they were “just flying over looking at all the boats on the water” as he denied they shot towards the water.

He said there might have been a few gunshots heard earlier when they were shooting pigs overland.

‘‘We saw a barra caught in the shallows and (the client) jumped out and grabbed it, and we flew to the bank to secure it,’’ Wright said.

The client, David Blanck, did not comment on the gunshots but said he had jumped out to grab the fish.

‘‘We saw a barra and I asked Matt what he thought and he said ‘jump in and get it’, and that is pretty much what we tried to do,’’ he said.

‘‘I jumped down, got it and tied it to the skid with a bungee cord, and flew to the bank and took photos.”

David Blanck with a barra he says he caught while heli-fishing with Matt Wright at Shady Camp.

NT Parks and Wildlife investigated the incident but later cleared the men of any wrongdoing after seeing a picture of the barramundi.

After the story was published, Michael Burbidge, who owned the chopper, allegedly stormed into the NT News office and confronted the paper’s editor, according to the Australian.

A year later, in a separate alleged shooting incident, a fishing charter operator reported seeing two R44 helicopters flying low near the Finniss River mouth as those on-board discharged what appeared to be automatic firearms, according to the FOI documents.

The Australian said the documents showed a man alleged to police that one of the pilots was Wright.

He said the choppers were hovering as if looking for something, possibly pigs, firing a hail of bullets which the man claims were landing within 100m of him and other fishermen.

When the fisherman, fearing for his life, called triple-zero the operator said she could also hear shots firing.

“He could hear the whizzing of bullets and they ducked their heads into the boat,” CASA recorded.

Police contacted Wright to arrange an interview and when CASA made contact, the croc wrangler said he had “no knowledge of this incident”.

Wright said his log book was not up to date and could not remember his movements that day but if he was around Finniss River, he would have been 10 nautical miles from the area.

CASA decided there was insufficient evidence of wrongdoing by Wright.

In March 2014 Wright took Hollywood star Gerard Butler on an outback adventure that involved buffalo hunting, heli-fishing and airboat rides.
After returning to the US, Butler shared a video of Wright’s chopper flying during an interview on Jimmy Kimmel Live.

The clip shows Wright’s black Robinson R44, the Australian reports, lurching towards Butler and other people before aiming its rotor towards the men and spinning above their heads then landing metres away.

“This guy is quite a famous adventurer in Australia,” the Scottish actor told Kimmel.

“I don’t want to say his name because it was … there was a lot of stuff I couldn’t even put on this video by the way, this is the tame stuff.”

As the video starts, Butler told the host “this is how we were flying about”.

“We didn’t even upload the best bit of this where we were spinning around at 70 miles per hour and him in the chopper right above us,” he said.

Sources have told the Australian Wright was “wild” the clip, filmed at the Peron Islands, was made public.

Scottish actor Gerard Butler with Matt Wright's dog.

Experienced helicopter pilots have also told the publication the chopper’s perceived proximity to the people on the beach appeared to breach CASA regulations.

They said the chopper was within “the dead man’s curve” for several seconds.

“Any cough or splutter from the engine would’ve killed them all,” a source told the Australian.

The documents show that after reviewing the footage and interviewing Wright, CASA found no breaches had occurred.

By the time CASA became aware of Butler’s video, investigators were probing another alleged incident involving the same chopper, registered VH-MEB, after receiving a tip-off it had drowned.

Helibrook chopper VH-MEB on a Northern Territory beach before it went underwater

Wright told CASA it did drown after he landed it on a beach to go fishing, claiming a diode of the starter relay stopped working and could not be fixed before the tide came in.

The croc wrangler said he was alone at the time and the helicopter’s maintenance release, where flying time is recorded, had floated away.

Burbidge flew out to retrieve and sling out the wreckage, according to the Australian, before Wright sold the written-off chopper to his mentor, cattle baron and former reality TV star Milton Jones – who later changed the registration to VH-NTH.

A year before Wright used the same chopper to take a 23-year-old man with cancer, Jett Brewster, on a unique joy ride.

Jett Brewster dangling beneath a chopper related to Matt Wright's operations

An article written by Outback Wrangler co-star Wilson, published in the November 2013 edition of North Australian Fishing and Outdoors magazine, said “Jett dangled airborne below the chopper for more than 30 minutes as Matt flew” across the Top End.

When CASA interviewed Wright and Brewster, who passed away last month, both said the slinging only lasted five minutes.

Wright said he did not think he needed authorisation for the “private operation”, according to the Australian.

In August 2015 CASA asked Wright to show cause why it should not – in light of previous incidents including the Butler video – vary, suspend or cancel his air transport or commercial pilot licences.

About seven months later CASA decided not to vary, cancel or suspend his licenses, after considering Wright’s response and representations made on his behalf.

“Rather, in this instance, I have decided to counsel you,” the acting regional manager wrote in a 10-page notice of counselling letter.

Outback Wrangler Matt Wright still has his helicopter licence.

Only two pages of this letter were not redacted before it was released to the Australian.

“Therefore the purpose of this letter is to formally record that you have been counselled during our face-to-face meeting in the Darwin CASA office on 9 March 2016,” it concluded.

In the years following, Wright and his choppers were involved in several other investigations, including a crash in Western Australia in April 2017 involving a helicopter operating under Wright’s air operator’s certificate.

One of Helibrook’s Robinson R44s, registered VH-LGN, crashed later that year in the NT with three passengers on board.

In December 2017 CASA contacted Wright after a Herald Sun story reported the croc wrangler asked his wife Kaia to jump from a hovering helicopter and chase a pig.

In May 2019 CASA sent Wright a “notice of decision to vary commercial pilot licence” and a couple of months later, CASA sent him a “notice of decision to vary conditions on commercial pilot licence”.

Both letters were fully redacted before being released to The Australian.

Since Wilson’s death, CASA has launched another five investigations into Helibrook – one on the fatal crash and another relating to alleged “unsafe behaviour reports”.

Helibrook’s operations were voluntarily suspended last year but Wright still has his pilot licence.

CASA told the Australian it was inappropriate to comment “noting other ongoing matters under investigation”.