Quote of the Week

Aviation Conspiracy Newsletter #471........................................................................March 9, 2008 Past newsletters can be accessed at: http://pages.prodigy.net/rockaway/ACNewsmenu.htm If you want to get the newsletter sent to you every week, sign up to AviationWatch. Bill Mulcahy rockaway@prodigy.net

Quote of the Week: “This would be the first application to the FAA for a [mandatory curfew] by any U.S. airport since Congress passed the Airport Noise and Capacity Act of 1990, which barred airport imposition of new access restrictions unless approved by the FAA,”
comment on a plan to impose a nighttime curfew in a news story this week by a Burbank Airport spokesperson

British Media Turning Against Aviation Polluters!!!

As Bill Sees It (Editorial): British Media Going Over To Anti-Airport Expansionist Side!!! The British branch of the Aviation Cabal must really be worrying. If you do a Google News search of the words "Heathrow" and "noise" you'll see what I mean. No doubt the news media owners are seeing that most of their readers (the public) are not buying the government's excuses for increasing aviation noise pollution and its health impacts and are reacting to it. Heathrow Airport is not the only British airport undergoing expansion. News media stories about Stansted and Luton Airport expansions are also pointing out the increased noise and health impacts as well as being critical of the government. Once again it is shown that the Europeans are leading the fight against the aviation polluters while American environmental groups are worrying about whether to use plastic or paper bags at the supermarket to stop global warming. Perhaps the reason for this is that airports expanded over a shorter period of time in England, whereas in the U.S. we have had a romance with aviation for over 70 years and have gotten used to being bombarded 24 hours-a-day with noise. The British government however, still seems oblivious to the rising clamor and talks about changing routes, no doubt in a desperate effort to get communities fighting among themselves. This is an old FAA tactic used to divert focus away from them and their aviation pollution increase schemes. I don't think it will work in England as it seems like there are too many people who have a strong resolve to fight. I think they are going to win. The Air Force Gives 40 Billion Dollar Tanker Contract To FOREIGNERS!!! If you want to see the depth (it could also be "debt") of corruption in the American government you just have to look at today's news stories about a 40 billion dollar contract to build refueling tankers being given to a foreign company. You cannot tell me that some air force general(s) or the people that they put in charge of procurement are not getting a kickback of some sort in this deal. I'm only surprised that there isn't more outrage by the public. Maybe after 7 years of Bush we've become tolerant of stupidity. I think whoever is responsible for this outrage should be waterboarded until they say what they got for selling out America. Can Burbank, California, Get The FAA Rats To Give Bob Hope Airport Community A Nighttime Curfew? There have been no airports given nighttime curfews instituted since the 1990 Airport Noise and Capacity Act of 1990 was passed, thanks to our corrupt political system where aviation industry lobbyist money is allowed to damage the health of millions of people. This act gave the FAA (not the EPA or any health agency) the right to allow the airline industry flights to expand (mostly air cargo) night operations. Since that time no airports or communities have been allowed to limit the number of flights going over their heads at night. We'll soon see if the human monsters that control the FAA will dare to defy their aviation polluter bosses and their political stooges and allow a curfew or continue to destroy the sleep and health of the people of Burbank, California.

Burbank, California: Burbank Community Wants Nighttime Curfew On Bob Hope Airport!!! Hoping to cut noise and costs, Bob Hope Airport officials this month will consider a proposed 10 p.m.-to-7 a.m. curfew and seek public input. The scheduled meeting marks the latest step in eight years of preparation to enter a rigorous curfew application process with the Federal Aviation Administration. The curfew would mostly hinder cargo planes that fly in and out of the airport, but also would eliminate nighttime noise and allow Bob Hope Airport to save $67 million in operation and residential noise insulation costs through 2015, said spokesman Victor Gill. Airport curfews are heavily restricted under federal law, requiring airports to submit detailed reports describing why a curfew is necessary and what impacts it would have. The Burbank airport has been working on its proposal since 2000. "They're so heavily restricted that nobody has been able to impose a curfew on (quieter) Class 3 jets since 1990," Gill said. To soften the impact of the airport's noise, it has also spent more than $90 million of its own money and federal grants insulating surrounding homes and schools. But homes on about 60 acres surrounding the airport are still not properly insulated from the sound, Gill said. When the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority meets to consider the proposal March 17, it plans to set a 45-day public comment period. Gill said it hopes to submit the final plan to the FAA by early summer. Once submitted, the FAA will likely take more than six months to decide whether to allow the curfew, Gill said. Ameriflight, an air cargo company based at Bob Hope Airport that would be significantly affected by the proposed curfew, did not return telephone calls seeking comment. Citizen watchdog group Restore Our Airport Rights chairman Howard Rothenbach said he was pleased with the news. "A curfew would be nice," he said. "I always thought a cap on flights would be more important than a curfew, but we'll take what we can get." http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_8495900

England: Government And Airline Operator "Fixed" Heathrow Third Runway Evidence!!! THE airports operator BAA colluded with government officials to “fix” the evidence in favour of a new third runway at Heathrow, an investigation has found. Documents seen by The Sunday Times reveal that BAA executives prevented the use of data in the consultation document which showed that the expansion would cause unlawful levels of pollution and extra noise. Instead, they gave civil servants amended data that showed the anticipated 230,000 extra flights a year at Heathrow would have a minimal impact on noise and pollution levels. A leaked report shows the government’s own watchdog, the Environment Agency, has now criticized the Department for Transport (DfT) consultation document into the third runway as flawed and incomplete. The agency says the science is not “sufficiently robust” to sustain the document’s backing for a third runway and that it has neglected to consider the health impact of the extra pollution, which could increase the risk of serious illness and deaths in the area. One official who was involved in “Project Heathrow” – the DfT unit that researched the environmental impact of the runway - said: “It’s a classic case of reverse engineering. They knew exactly what results they wanted and fixed the inputs to get there. It’s appalling.” http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/transport/article3512218.ece Editor's Note: Sounds like the British government is taking notes on how the U.S. Aviation Cabal has been operating. The FAA is famous for conjuring up technical reasons for avoiding politically protected areas (another job for the FAA's Office of Technical Excuses). Maybe their next move will be to remove funding for any office in the environmental agency that deals with noise health impacts. That's what "our" congress did in 1980!!!

N.Y. Times Finally Discovers Noise/Blood Pressure Story!!! Noise while you are sleeping can significantly raise your blood pressure, even when it does not wake you up, a new study suggests. Researchers monitored 140 generally healthy men and women ages 45 to 70 as they slept near four European airports. They used electronic devices to monitor blood pressure and to measure noise levels from airplanes, traffic and indoor sounds. Noise incidents varied from 5 decibels, roughly the sound of a quiet room, to more than 90 decibels, the equivalent of a loud stereo. The study was posted online Feb. 12 in The European Heart Journal. At each site, the effects were consistent: a noise of 35 decibels or more — roughly equivalent to an airplane passing overhead or a bed partner’s loud snoring — was associated with an average 6.2 increase in systolic blood pressure (the first number) and a 7.4 increase in diastolic pressure; the louder the noise, the greater the increase. The source of the noise made no difference, and people did not get used to it through the night. Every time noise occurred, blood pressure went up. “It may well be that continuous exposure to noise for a long time will eventually give rise to a chronic increase in blood pressure,” said Dr. Lars Jarup, the senior author and a reader in public health at Imperial College London. “And it’s fair to say that if you increase blood pressure until you are clinically hypertensive, this is a major risk factor for cardiovascular illness.” http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/04/health/research/04haza.html?ref=health

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Important Aviation News Stories This Week

Burbank Airport planning on curfew

Authority will present a draft of study that would impose limits on flights from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m.

By Jeremy Oberstein http://www.burbankleader.com/articles/2008/03/08/politics/blr-curfew08.txt

BURBANK — Capping off years of debate, the tri-cities’ governing board of Bob Hope Airport announced it will present a plan to implement a mandatory curfew that would halt all late-night and early-morning flights at the airport, officials said.

But its passage could be in doubt if the Federal Aviation Administration grounds the plan.

The Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority will present a draft of the Part 161 Study, which would impose a mandatory curfew on all flights from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m., to the public at its March 17 meeting, and conduct an initial study session, airport spokesman Victor Gill said.

The study will then be subject to a 45-day comment period, a public workshop and public hearing, for which dates have not been set. Then it will then undergo the FAA approval process, Gill said.

News that the study will move forward comes more than two months after an administrative law judge allowed the airport to operate outside of state-mandated noise restrictions while it worked to reduce the noise burden for residents in the area. It also comes nearly two months after the Burbank City Council blessed the ruling after years of pressuring the authority to pass the noise restriction.

“We’ve been calling for this for years and years and sat in meetings and looked at the committees and said ‘we have to do this,’” Burbank Mayor Marsha Ramos said. “Did the council push the authority? I believe so. But it helped that the judge supported our position and acknowledged the value of moving in that direction.”

The curfew would affect an average of 36 flights every night and would force their aeronautical operations to shift to surrounding airports during the curfew, Gill said.

Van Nuys Airport could receive 16 flights, Ontario International Airport 13 flights, and Los Angeles International Airport might get three flights if the curfew is passed, he said.

Penalties for breaking the curfew would range from about $3,600 for first-time violators to twice and three times that amount for airlines that fly outside of the restriction two or three times, respectively, in a 12-month period, Gill said.

The fourth violation in a year would result in a fine of nearly $15,000 and a suspension or outright ban of flying into or out of the airport, he said.

Residents have called for the curfew since the airport authority was established in 1978, and the authority started working on the study in 2000, Gill said.

The study has been amended, vetted and refined through nearly a decade’s worth of edits and at a cost to the airport of about $6 million to compile the study, he said.

Residents near the airport praised the authority’s decision to move forward, saying the curfew would provide a much-needed ban against private and business planes that now roam the night and early-morning skies.

“The real problems come from private flights,” said Stan Hyman, who lives about three miles from the airport.

“We’ve been hoping for this forever.”

But before those flights can be eliminated, the FAA has to approve the curfew, which some say could be an uphill battle.

In a 2004 letter from the FAA, Victoria Catlett, an official in the office of airport planning and programming, said the benefits of a curfew would not be worth the cost to canceled flights.

The letter also called into question the point of a mandatory curfew, as the voluntary curfew has a compliance rate of about 97%.

Airport officials contested the FAA’s position that the cost of the curfew would outweigh the benefits.

The cost to airlines, passengers, cargo carriers and general aviation could total $55 million for the 10-year length of the curfew from canceled flights, while savings that would occur by a reduced need for residential acoustical treatment programs near the airport with a curfew in place would amount to $67 million for the same period, Gill said.

The mandatory curfew would exempt certain flights for certain medical emergencies and in some cases where inclement weather delays flights, Gill said.

“This would be the first application to the FAA for a [mandatory curfew] by any U.S. airport since Congress passed the Airport Noise and Capacity Act of 1990, which barred airport imposition of new access restrictions unless approved by the FAA,” he said. “This is groundbreaking territory. We know we have an uphill battle, but the deal is to fight the fight and go as far as we can.”

Other airports, such as Orange County’s John Wayne Airport, have mandatory curfews in that they impose a restriction on flying from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m., but no airport has ever asked for a curfew after 1990 for quieter, stage 3 planes, Gill said.

“Prior to the Airport Noise and Capacity Act, the FAA was silent on curfews,” he said.

“It’s hard to gauge what the FAA is thinking because no airport has ever started and finished a 161 study.”