{"id":678786,"date":"2026-01-07T00:27:19","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T00:27:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/678786\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T00:27:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T00:27:19","slug":"buckingham-palace-responds-to-criticism-over-royal-familys-helicopter-use-royals-celebrity-news-and-gossip-entertainment-photos-and-videos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/678786\/","title":{"rendered":"Buckingham Palace Responds to Criticism Over Royal Family\u2019s Helicopter Use | Royals | Celebrity News and Gossip | Entertainment, Photos and Videos"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Buckingham Palace is pushing back on criticism surrounding the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justjared.com\/tags\/royals\/\" title=\"Royals\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>royal family<\/strong><\/a>\u2019s helicopter use after new data shed light on how frequently they are flown.<\/p>\n<p>According to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/news\/2026\/01\/04\/eco-king-airmiles-to-fly-twice-round-world-helicopters\/\" onclick=\"getOutboundLink(&#039;https:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/news\/2026\/01\/04\/eco-king-airmiles-to-fly-twice-round-world-helicopters\/&#039;); return false;\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Telegraph<\/a>, the two AgustaWestland AW139 helicopters currently leased by the royal family logged a combined 58,000 miles of travel. <\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"hidearticle\">Keep reading to find out more\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>They also racked up a reported 420 hours of flying time between February 25, 2025 and late November 2025.<\/p>\n<p>In response to the attention, a spokesperson for Buckingham Palace defended the use of helicopters.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHelicopters are a key component of the royal travel plan due to their unique capability to access remote regions of the U.K., which are not otherwise readily served by other modes of transport. They also allow members of the Royal family to undertake multiple engagements in a given day,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.justjared.com\/tags\/princess-anne\/\" title=\"Princess Anne\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Princess Anne<\/strong><\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justjared.com\/tags\/prince-william\/\" title=\"Prince William\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Prince William<\/strong><\/a> were identified as the most frequent users of the aircraft. Flight data cited by The Telegraph showed <strong>Anne<\/strong>\u2019s Gatcombe Park estate as the most common destination, with 68 stops. <\/p>\n<p><strong>William<\/strong> reportedly landed 47 times in Windsor and made five trips to Forest Lodge, the Windsor-area home he shares with wife <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justjared.com\/tags\/kate-middleton\/\" title=\"Kate Middleton\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Princess Kate Middleton<\/strong><\/a> and their three children. <strong>Kate<\/strong> has also used helicopters for solo engagements, while she and <strong>William<\/strong> traveled together for joint duties throughout 2025.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.justjared.com\/2025\/12\/28\/prince-george-video-sparks-backlash-after-mans-christmas-greeting-goes-viral\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">An awkward moment recently went viral from the royal family\u2019s Christmas walkabout involving <strong>Prince George<\/strong>.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\tPhotos: Getty Images\t\t\tPosted to: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justjared.com\/tags\/royals\/\" title=\"View all posts in Royals\" rel=\"category tag noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Royals<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Buckingham Palace is pushing back on criticism surrounding the royal family\u2019s helicopter use after new data shed light&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":678787,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7708],"tags":[5105,7710,519,448],"class_list":{"0":"post-678786","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-royals","8":"tag-royal","9":"tag-royal-families","10":"tag-royal-family","11":"tag-royals"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115850984969145477","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=678786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/678787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=678786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=678786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=678786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}