This year, he was the helicopter mayor.
Mayor de Blasio’s use of NYPD choppers rose dramatically in 2016, with his hizzoner taking a total of 14 rides including 10 trips in the last three months alone, according to department logs.
That’s a far cry from 2014, when the newly-minted mayor used the department’s fleet on just three occasions. In 2015, he took only two copter rides.
The numbers emerged after the NYPD responded to The Post’s Freedom of Information request about de Blasio’s use of department helicopters. But the documents released offer scant details on many of the flights.
The stark uptick in flights comes during a busy year for de Blasio, who’s already begun ramping up his campaign efforts.
When he was grilled on the subject during a late Oct. press conference, hizzoner claimed to take only a “handful” of helicopter flights a year, but the flight data sheets released by the NYPD show a much different picture.
While several of the rides were on account of emergencies, such as flights to Jacobi Hospital to visit with injured FDNY or NYPD members, some of the entries in the flight data sheets are vague.
On three occasions, de Blasio and his staffers appeared to use two choppers at the same time, NYPD flight log records revealed.
The aviation unit flight sheet and de Blasio’s public schedule for Aug. 2 show that two helicopters with two separate crews chauffeured the “mayor and staff” to deliver remarks at five separate locations for the National Night Out Against Violence.
A month later, on Sept. 8, de Blasio and a separate “flight of 4 Pax [or passengers]” flew in separate helicopters around the city to usher in the new school year at five schools.
Two other choppers both tied to the mayor through NYPD records also appear to have flown him and staff out to Queens for a Town Hall meeting later that month.
City Hall spokesperson Eric Phillips said de Blasio’s staff rides with him when he flies, and could’t say who was in the second helicopters on those occasions.
Phillips added that it’s up to the NYPD, and not the mayor, as to how de Blasio gets around the city.
“NYPD makes decisions on how to get him around the city that are entirely dependent on events in the city. It goes up and down naturally year by year, as it did for other mayors,” he said.
Phillips also said all the flights were for his role as mayor, not personal use.
The Post asked the NYPD and City Hall to disclose the copter data after reporting that de Blasio had hopped into an NYPD helicopter in October so he could zip from private meetings in Brooklyn to an event in Queens.
