Israeli civilian pilot in hot water for helicopter trip over southern Lebanon
Civil Aviation Authority probing whether flight path, which included Hezbollah villages, was by mistake or design
Sue Surkes is The Times of Israel's environment reporter

An Israeli civilian pilot flew his privately owned helicopter over southern Lebanon on Thursday, even though air traffic control had told him to stay south of the Israeli-Lebanese border.
The Civil Aviation Authority is investigating whether the pilot got lost or deliberately crossed the border, and has confiscated his civilian aviator’s license.
The pilot took off from the northern city of Kiryat Shmona and may have attempted to fly in a straight line southwestwards toward the coastal city of Nahariya, a route that would necessarily take him over southern Lebanon, Channel 2 reported.
An initial investigation found that the pilot flew three to five kilometers into Lebanese territory for four and half minutes, for reasons that are not yet clear.
His flight path took him over villages controlled by Hezbollah, including Bint Jbeil, a focus of fighting between Israeli forces and the terror group during the 2006 Israel-Lebanon war. In 2010, then Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Bint Jbeil to show solidarity with Hezbollah.
[mappress mapid=”5711″]
It took Israeli air defense authorities several attempts to contact the pilot and to establish that he was an Israeli and not an enemy, Channel 2 reported.
A source close to the probe described the incident as “most grave,” telling Channel 2 that only luck stood between the pilot and the danger of being shot down by Hezbollah.