Passers-by cringed and covered their ears as opponents of the F-35 staged a noisy demonstration in Burlington’s City Hall Park on Tuesday morning.
It wasn’t the chanting and drum-banging typically heard at protests that was causing those within earshot to wince in pain. It was what organizers said was a replication of the roar the F-35 would produce over downtown Winooski at an altitude of 1000 feet after takeoff from the Vermont Air Guard base at Burlington International Airport.
“You’re making my walls vibrate!” a nearby resident complained to protest leader Chris Hurd at the conclusion of the six-minute-long blast of sound. David Harrison, who lives at 141 Main Street, told Hurd, “You’re disturbing businesses across the street.”
A couple of the F-35 opponents gathered for the media event responded in unison, “That’s exactly the point.”
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I live 5 mins. from the airport. Love this demonstration. Literal demonstration.
Why weren’t they arrested for trespassing? Oh, they’re protestors not dirty poor people.
Because it’s a public park, and whether you like their bathing habits or their politics or not, you can’t trespass on public property (despite what the Burlington City Council and police would like to think).
I meant that ironically. Oh well.
Public park or not, you have to have a permit to demonstrate. Did they have one?
I had hoped so. But it’s hard to pick up on in web-speak. Apparently, some people actually think a permit or the act of protest is in question here, and it is… it all comes down to freedom — and the freedom politicians want to limit with permits to protest and killing machines roaring through our skies.
Anyone can get a permit in Burlington. All they need to do is apply. No one was going to deny the anti F35 zealots a permit. People do not have the right to just take over a public space whenever they feel like it and do whatever they want. So, I ask again, did the perpetrators of this stunt get a permit?