In the mountains of Vermont, neighbors feud over an aviation CEO’s personal airstrip

The aging interlopers were worried about getting arrested.

Arrest and charges

The owners had recently issued no-trespass orders to 23 neighbors, including them.

“I’m gonna stay on the road because I was warned,” said Dan Guy, a 72-year-old retired carpenter, peering over a stone wall at the 900-foot grass landing strip that has deeply divided neighbors in this rural Vermont town.

They were soon confronted by two men who followed them down the road and told the group surveillance cameras had caught them on the property.

The men refused to identify themselves but were well known to Guy: caretakers for the owners, Kyle Clark, chief executive of one of Vermont’s most successful startups, electric plane manufacturer Beta Technologies, and his wife, Katie.

“We’re going to get photos of the cars that are here,” said one, sporting a backward hat in camo with the Beta logo on it, as he rushed past the neighbors.

Case background

They were hiking up a steep, rutted, public road through a 130-acre estate to the site of a proposed airstrip they had fought for years.