As someone who spends a lot of time in the back doing exactly this kind of job I cant help but think this was a bit off mark.
Yes it's great fun, looks amazing and is a real rush but for those reasons alone I feeling this was either poorly thought out or more likely actually a stunt to enhance the show.
Aerial cameramen have at their disposal many new (not so new now) tools to choose from that get far more dynamic shots in a far more safer environment. In fact you can almost limit the exposure to zero in most cases. Loosing a motor is almost a non event now as both the crew and the camera can walk away from it. Obviously there are risks but I would hazard a guess and say that if anything had gone wrong on that shoot the aircraft would have been bent, people hurt and the industry as a whole condemned.
As an example, during the filming of District 9 we were tasked to film convoys, shoot outs, car chases and riots. All of this was filmed within the existing laws of South Africa, no special permissions required.
He was a good cameraman though, very impressive!