Your recent posting of the final version of the MITRE Report was exceptional. It illustrated once again that an airport at the former Marine Corps Air Station is dangerous, ill planned and high risk.
As you know the MITRE Corporation, is part of the Center for Advanced Aviation System Development, located in McLean, Virginia. MITRE and was contracted by the FAA to do an analysis of the Air Traffic Control Impact of the proposed airport at El Toro.
A few months ago, both the LA Times and the Orange County Register provided advanced information from this report, which reflected poorly on the planning of an airport at El Toro. In response to that news release, both the pro-airport side and Mr. Herman Bliss from the Western Regional FAA stated that the report was only a working paper and did not raise grave concerns. They stated, in essence, that we would have to wait for the finished report and see what changes were made.
It is very refreshing to see that the report you posted is the completed copy of the MITRE Report that both the County and the Western Region FAA have just received. The other interesting fact is that the MITRE Corporation did not make any substantial changes from the original report that was submitted to the FAA.
It is now time for all your readers to review, study and comment on the MITRE report because it clearly shows and reaches many of the same conclusions that professional pilots, professional pilot organizations, commercial air carriers and air traffic controllers organizations have stated over and over again: While El Toro served the country well as a Marine Corps Jet training base it is not conducive to a commercial airport.
Take offs into raising terrain with heavy loaded aircraft, with a tail wind, and into the arriving and departing aircraft traffic from the numerous airports in the area is unsafe, unwanted and ill advised.
In reviewing the report your readers must recognize that this MITRE Report was based on data provided to the MITRE Corporation by the County. As you can see, it is not close to the actual airport plan proposed by the County. For example, the proposed traffic for this report was based on a total of only 156 flights per day. Yet in the country Airport System Master Plan, the proposed airport at El Toro calls for 824 flights per day, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Even with these limited number of flights, the MITRE report clearly reflects critical areas of safety concerns.
The MITRE Report questions takeoffs towards Lake Forest, Mission Viejo and points East do to the rising terrain. It questions takeoffs to the North towards Loma Ridge and shows that air traffic controllers, who along with the pilots are responsible for the safe flow of traffic, would not have radar contract with the departing aircraft due to the terrain.
The report states: “to the north and east, the Minimum Vectoring Altitudes (MVA) range from 4,000 to 7,000 feet. It is impractical to run aircraft below this altitude, since the controller has no flexibility to maneuver the aircraft to separate it from other traffic”. The report states that the air traffic controller would loss radar contact with the aircraft as it departs from El Toro, due to the terrain.
The report clearly shows that effectiveness and efficiency of arriving traffic into LAX, Ontario, Long Beach and Orange County Airport, (John Wayne), is impacted. Even with the limited number of only 156 flights per day that were studied, there is grave concern for aircraft getting too close to each other. What would the report say if it had to analyze 824 flights per day?
The MITRE Corporation also states in their report that a departure to the North (runway 34) towards Tustin, Villa Park, Anaheim, requires the use of airspace that is not available in the given configuration. In reference to aircraft departing to the North the report states that the addition of NZJ (El Toro) traffic has a significant impact on the north side of the airport. Most conspicuously, every departure from Runway 34 (to the North) is in conflict with arrivals to Orange County Airport. This is another point that the professional commercial pilots and air traffic controllers have been stating over and over.
To help solve this problem on takeoffs to the North, we have been told that the Western Regional FAA will propose that the departing aircraft make a left turn shortly after takeoff. This maneuver would bring the aircraft over populated areas of Northwood, Tustin, the heart of Irvine and then out towards Newport Beach.
Another interesting point, and one your readers must understand, is that the MITRE Report suggest that departures from some runway other than Runway 7, (to the East), appear to be necessary for the operation of El Toro as a civilian airport. The only runway available in the present airport configuration is Runway 25 to the West, towards Irvine and Newport Beach. Although this is the safest runway, and the one pilots state they will have to use due to the prevailing winds at El Toro, the county claims that takeoffs to the West will not be allowed.
Len, I have just covered a few of the key safety issues promulgated in this very interesting analysis. The airport planners told us to wait until the MITRE Report was completed and they would comment. Well, your readers have the report and it would be interesting to have them express their concerns to our representatives.
Tom O’Malley
12/10/00
Thomas O’Malley, is Deputy Director of ETRPA. He is a retired
United States Marine Corps Colonel with over 26 years of active service.
More than half of his career as a Marine Aviator was spent at El Toro.
During that time, he served as: