02/17/2009: "Still Time To Comment On Jets Over County"

The Navy plans to increase training for Washington-based crews in its Northwest Training Range Complex, off the coasts of Washington, Oregon and northern California. That means the Navy wants to increase operations At NAS Whidbey. And that in turn means that Whidbey’s aircraft will fly more frequently.

The EA-6B Prowlers, their r EA-18 G Growlers, P-3 Orions and their replacement P-8A Poseidons exercises would double at NAS Whidbey, from about 2,300 sorties per year, to in excess of 4,500.

The Navy is inviting public comment on the draft Environmental Impact Statement ; but time is running out to comment on it.

Comments were to be accepted until February 18, 2009, but that has now been extended to March 11 -see story above. Comments can be submitted by email, or they can be mailed in using an approved Comment Form (the form can also be down loaded Here. )

Read background information on the proposal from “Line Time” of Guemes Island:

The Navy is proposing to create an enhanced training playground in the Pacific NW largely using existing airspace and ocean training areas, the Northwest Training Range Complex. By enhanced, I mean that the Navy will be simulating more kinds of combat using some of the newer aircraft and ship systems and integrating these in more realistic ways.

Think of their proposal as a 21st-century combat computer game, except with real planes and ships. The DEIS lists the environmental impacts of the greater activity in existing level of use, plus what will likely be affected in two alternative proposals having increased activity. The Navy prefers one of the more active proposals that would double the number of flights to and from NAS Whidbey Island.

In the 1990's, Guemes and some Lopez Islanders and fought an air war with the Navy because of EA6B flights that became concentrated over Guemes. At the time the Navy relocated a traffic pattern northwards to answer burgeoning noise complaints on Whidbey Island. the Navy relented and relocated the overflights to the historical air traffic patterns over Whidbey.

NAS Whidbey Island is where some of the newer hardware will be based in the enhanced plan for the range airspace. The actual training, however, will take place miles away, much of it in the airspace and waters off the west coast of Washington and Oregon, as well as over the Okanogan.

Over the next few years the Navy will be replacing two plane types currently stationed at Whidbey. The first is the aging P-3 Orion anti-submarine turboprop patrol plane, a militarized version of a 50's-era commercial passenger aircraft. It will be replaced by the P-8, a Boeing 737-800, also a version of a familiar passenger plane. The Navy plans to fly more missions than they currently do from NAS Whidbey, but the P-8 aircraft will be quiet, at least relative to the EA6B's that troubled Guemes more than a decade ago.

The replacement for the EA6B Prowlers will be the E-18 Growler, an electronic warfare version of the F/A-18 Superhornet. Both of these aircraft have a mission of messing with enemy radars and communications. The newer Growler, however, is faster and will also be able to defend itself better than the old Prowler, using air-to-air missiles and dogfighting tactics. This new capability will require more training for the Growler aircrews, thus providing some justification for the enhanced training ranges and increased use.

The EA-18 Growler has afterburner engines and is generally noisier than the older Prowler. The Navy in their DEIS mapped out the expected noise footprint around NAS Whidbey Island.