The mood among F-35 opponents gathered in an Old North End conference room Tuesday evening contrasted starkly with the triumphalist atmosphere inside a Vermont Air Guard hangar earlier in the day.
About a dozen members of the Stop the F-35 Coalition sat glumly around a table a few hours after the state’s political leaders and hundreds of uniformed Air Guard members cheered the decision to base 18 of the stealth fighter-bombers in Vermont beginning in 2020.
The activists who have fought the local basing option for more than four years were reluctant to discuss their next steps with a reporter. However, they agreed to offer responses to Tuesday’s announcement prior to conducting a private strategy discussion.
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It’s over. Bring on the jets. We all are so proud they are coming!
I would consider the hundreds of families that would be affected by the downsizing of our guard as working class vermonters who have needs Mr. Fleckenstein.
Bluto: Hey! What’s all this laying around stuff? Why are you all still laying around here for?
Stork: What the hell are we supposed to do, ya moron? We’re all expelled. There’s nothing to fight for anymore.
D-Day: [to Bluto] Let it go. War’s over, man. Wormer dropped the big one.
Bluto: What? Over? Did you say “over”? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no!
Otter: [to Boon] Germans?
Boon: Forget it, he’s rolling.
Bluto: And it ain’t over now. ‘Cause when the goin’ gets tough…
[thinks hard of something to say]
Bluto: The tough get goin’! Who’s with me? Let’s go!
So what about the hundreds of families that WILL be affected by bringing the F-35’s to Vermont? Is the Guard more important then these neighborhoods and the people in it who will have declining property values with homes they have lived in for years, suffer health issues due to the high decibels, and watch our environment impacted by these high powered military planes? Thank you to Dumont and Fleckenstein for continuing to ask for the score sheets and environmental impact statements that the Air Force is so reluctant to share, which makes Burlington the “ideal” location for these military jets. I think you may be surprised by the answers….
I’m sure everyone would be rightly concerned if the US Air Force even HINTED that VTANG would close. Then you might have a case to be worried about the base downsizing. Yet the USAF has emphatically stated that if the F35s are not based at BTV, then the VTANG mission would continue. So the whole fear-mongering campaign about the demise of VTANG, that was spread oftentimes by VTANG spokesmen themselves, was a totally false and carefully orchestrated ruse which mthbwu and many others fell for hook, line and sinker. Hey, we civilians have to sacrifice for our military, right? Oh, wait…wasn’t that supposed to work the other way around?
The reality – this is so bad it required an EIS and ‘fudging’ data to bed down at BIA. Most people don’t seem to realize that the EIS isn’t a requirement for a plane – it’s only required when the plane is known to be *SO* bad for an area the Air Force has to show just how bad it is with the months of research that go into an EIS. It’s also why people think the opposition to the F-35’s is crazy – because they don’t believe the facts the Air Force posted in the EIS. The reality is, according to on the ground testing and recording in areas where the F-35 is being flown currently, it’s actually much worse. This decision to base a largely untested plane (with damaging sound levels and a high crash risk) in a residential area will leave Burlington’s residents holding the bag when lawsuits from hundreds to thousands of affected homeowners go over the $13 Million dollar mark (the city’s current insurance level) – since the property devaluation that’s happening (according to the EIS) will be over $100 million.
Has Vermont’s economy gone so far into the toilet that our only choice left is between warfare and welfare?
I love how you like to believe everything in the EIS but then think that the Guard is lying to you…
The EIS was done because of the enviornmental nazi’s in VT, and catering to them. They knew the planes were coming and they knew the enviro-wacko’s would demand an EIS so they prepared one to appease the masses. What DOD should have done was just said look, we are going to do what we want so screw you.
I can understand the strategy, Act 250 and the extremism it enabled is the reason you can’t build a road or sewer treatment plant in Vermont anymore. Unable to sway our power pols, the last ditch move is to try to litigate it to death. Will it work? Ask an attorney.
Fat lady singing
The EIS is done because of laws that were enacted, beginning in 1978, that set standards for acceptable noise levels across the United States. The program that manages the Environmental Impact Statement program it is called the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) http://www.epa.gov/compliance/…
I don’t believe the Guard is lying to us, I believe the F-35, through the EIS and real world testing, has proven itself a poor fit for the Burlington International Airport.
An increase in the Cyber Security and Communications Missions that the VTANG is already engaged in (spread between Northfield and South Burlington) would be a much better fit. I would also be open to drones and other jets similar to a noise profile the F-16 makes (like the Scorpion under development) be stationed here.
“I don’t believe the Guard is lying to us,”
So when they say they won’t need to use the afterburners on take off which will actually mean less noise then the F-16’s which currently need the afterburners on take off you believe them and you are just using the noise level as a hypothetical?
The mission and physics, not the Guard spokesman, dictates the use of afterburners. As for sound volume, according to the EIS and sound recordings on the ground, the sound recorded (not modeled as in the EIS) by the F-35 is 115 dB non afterburner/131 dB afterburner. The sound recorded (again not modeled) by an F-16 is 94 dB non-afterburner/104 dB afterburner. These recordings may be slightly different here as they were not recorded at BIA. An increase of 10 dB means a doubling of sound – therefore the F-35 is at least 2 times, but as much as 6 times louder than an F-16 in real world conditions. In current use, the F-35’s are using afterburner 90% to 95% of the time (according to Air Force reports). Interestingly, Burlington International Airport meets the 8,000 foot minimum length requirements by a short margin – 320 feet – which increases the likelihood of afterburner use. Also – similar to the F-16 – external fuel tanks are being developed for the F-35. External fuel tanks would insure afterburner use.
But just so we are clear, you believe the Air Force regarding the EIS but not when they say they won’t be using afterburners during take off…
No – I’m saying neither the Guard spokesperson nor the EIS have the authority to give a proper indication or guarantee on actual afterburner use. That order would be contained in the mission directives (combat or training) which would be handed down from an Air Force Commander(s).
However, based on a statement from an Air Force Commander, it was estimated to be 90-95% afterburner use. So when you factor in that external fuel tanks are planned (http://pdf.aiaa.org/preview/CD…, the minimum length runway requirement, the statement(s) and current use – the probability for afterburner use is extremely high.