Park Slopers had their chance to complain about plane noise over their neighborhood, and now Brooklyn Heights locals are expressing their concerns about that incessant helicopter noise overhead. The tourist choppers that are sonically torturing them are all coming from the Downtown Manhattan Heliport, and the Brooklyn Paper is fueling the fire by reporting that the noise could cause brain damage.
A noise expert told them that chopper sounds, or any constant white noise, can cause brain damage and heart attacks; he noted, “It doesn’t matter if you feel like, ‘I can tough this out’—your body doesn’t know that.”
One resident told them, “You can often see four or five helicopters in the air, and another five or six idling on the [Manhattan] pad. The helicopters zoom right overhead like a scene out of Apocalypse Now.” Now the locals, along with Councilman Steve Levin (D-Williamsburg) and state Sen. Daniel Squadron (D-Brooklyn Heights), are rallying and urging the city to institute quiet hours.
