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Published: 2007-03-29 07:55:16
Updated: 2007-03-29 07:55:16

Posted: March 29, 2007

Battle Over Proposed Landing Field Heads To D.C.

Navy To Discuss Proposed Landing Field in Eastern N.C.

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Navy To Discuss Proposed Landing Field in Eastern N.C.
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Raleigh, N.C. — The dispute over a proposed Navy landing field in North Carolina is heading to the nation's capital.

The Navy hopes to practice its own takeoffs and landings in an area near the Beaufort-Washington County line. Two Navy studies show the area is the best place for an outlying landing field, but critics said it is too close to a wildlife refuge for birds.

Critics have also said they are worried about the field's effect on the environment.

Several state leaders, including Gov. Mike Easley and state Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler, are against the proposal. U.S. Rep. David Price, D-N.C., has also voiced his opposition to the plan.

Opponents from Washington County will go to Washington D.C. Thursday to ask Congress to withhold funding for the airfield.

The battle over the proposed landing field has been going on for more than six years now. The next public hearing about the outlying landing field will be next Wednesday in Plymouth.

Copyright 2011 by Capitol Broadcasting Company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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The U.S. Navy said it wants to use 30,000 acres to create an area where jet fighter pilots can practice touch-and-go landings. Officials said as many as 70 landings could take place a day.
Ashen-Shugar
March 29, 2007 7:07 p.m.
Combat pilots would practice aircraft carrier landings with F/A-18 Super Hornets based at Oceana Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach, Va., and Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point in Havelock.

Navy redeployment plans would base 120 Super Hornets at Oceana and 24 at Cherry Point.

Dozens of families would be forced to sell their farms to make room for the outlying landing field, or OLF. Opponents also worry that the site is just five miles from Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge, a winter haven each year for about 100,000 migratory waterfowl.
Ashen-Shugar
March 29, 2007 7:05 p.m.
I have seen a lot of comments about the wildlife refuge next door to the purposed landing strip. Is this area ALWAYS have a high density of migrating birds? I thought that the Navy like the air force have a program out that requires the pilot to do their training when bird strikes are at there lowest. Have I missed something here or are these fighters going to do landings 24/7. I am willing to bet that this facility would be used heavily at only certain times of the year and other times when bird strike hazards are high, they will not
Panther
March 29, 2007 6:26 p.m.
What does that have to do with anything? Why move from where they are now?
Ashen-Shugar
March 29, 2007 4:50 p.m.
Since you know all about the area and I do to, name me one area this side of the Mississippi River that is not in a wetland and is this unihabited. Just one.
Doctor Dataclerk
March 29, 2007 4:46 p.m.
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