Taking off With Different Views About Living With Airport Noise

I sympathize with the fine folks of Santa Ana Heights and Newport Beach who live under the flight path (of John Wayne Airport) (“Airport Ruling Lands on Peace of Santa Ana Heights,” Commentary by Joseph Bell, March 24). Residents of Point Loma and other beautiful areas around the San Diego airport suffer similar problems. However, it should be pointed out that the airports were there long before most of the inhabitants, and airports don’t usually fade away.

Mr. Bell claims that the reason for the change was that the FAA demanded that John Wayne procedures conform with those of other airports around the country. That’s hogwash. The predominant issue here was safety. As any pilot knows (I flew B-29s during WWII), the most vulnerable attitude for an aircraft is during takeoff. And when the aircraft is extremely nose high in a steep climb at low altitude, and then you suddenly reduce full power to minimum power in order to decrease the noise level on the ground, you are vulnerable. Any significant malfunction of the equipment or miscalculation of the pilot leaves little room for recovery.

But I do have a solution. Twenty-five years ago we bought (along with hundreds of other shrewd investors) several parcels of vacant land near the “soon-to-be-built international airport” at Palmdale. They’re still there. And except for an occasional sonic boom from a returning Space Shuttle, there is very little air traffic noise. I’m open to your offer, Mr. Bell.

RON WALKER

Huntington Beach