"Threat to Close Emergency Airfield in Pacific Upsets Airlines"

Saturday, October 30, 2004

Threat to Close Emergency Airfield in Pacific Upsets Airlines
By MATTHEW L. WALD
The New York (NY) Times


WASHINGTON, - The Bush administration is threatening to shut an airfield at
Midway Atoll in the mid-Pacific that has been available as an emergency
landing site for decades. The airlines say the closing would force many
two-engine planes flying between North America and Asia to make a long
detour to hug the coastline of Alaska and the Russian far east, and could
force some flight cancellations.

Three- and four-engine planes are not required to stay within a certain
range of emergency fields. But safety experts say that these planes will
still face increased risk in flying the mid-Pacific route, because they will
be farther from land in case of fire, system failure or passenger illness,
which are the main reasons for emergency landings.

The airlines are furious. "It seems like the government has just lost sight
of the importance of Midway," said Gene Cameron, the manager of flight
dispatching at United Airlines. Dispatchers plan aircraft routes based on
prevailing winds and, especially in flights over water, availability of
alternate landing spots.

But the Transportation Department, which has paid $3.5 million to the
Interior Department to keep the airfield open for the last few months, is
determined to stop. "There is no other airport available to commercial
interests that we pay to operate," said Brian Turmail, a Transportation
Department spokesman.

Midway was a naval base until 1993, and for several years after that its
operation was financed by a private company that brought in visitors for
"eco-tourism." When that venture failed, the Interior Department, which
controls the atoll, said it would stop paying to operate the airfield. The
Transportation Department began picking up the costs in late 2002 but does
not want to bear the long-term obligation. 

On Friday, the Transportation Department said that it would pay about
$300,000 to keep the field open until Nov. 20 and that it would meet with
the airlines to discuss the field's economic and safety significance. Along
with the airlines, which are in financial distress, a possible contributor
is Boeing, which met some of Midway's costs in the 1990's. Boeing
specializes in two-engine aircraft, while its rival Airbus concentrates on
four-engine models. 

Midway is 2,800 miles west of San Francisco, 2,200 miles east of Japan and
about 150 miles east of the international date line. Planes bound to Asia
from North America usually fly near the Aleutians and the Russian far east
because of prevailing winds, but tend to return on a more southerly route. 

Mr. Cameron of United Airlines said he calculated that a Boeing 777 that had
to return on the northerly route instead would take nearly 90 minutes longer
to reach the west coast of the United States and burn nearly $4,000 more
fuel. 

Continental Airlines plans to begin service on Dec. 15 from Nagoya, Japan,
to Honolulu in a Boeing 767, a twin-engine plane. But without Midway
available, it will probably drop the route, said Rahsaan Johnson, a
Continental spokesman. Under rules for twin-engine planes, the 767 would
have to follow a circuitous route to stay within range of Micronesia, he
said, and the airline would have to leave seats or cargo holds empty so it
could carry enough fuel. "We'd be flying a plane full of fuel," he said. 

A Boeing 777 flown by Continental made an unscheduled stop in Midway in
January because of an engine problem. Northwest and American would also be
affected. 

Another possible site for diversions is Wake Island, but it is more than
1,100 miles away. In a recent letter to the Office of Management and Budget,
two Democrats in the Senate, Daniel K. Inouye of Hawaii and Patty Murray of
Washington, complained that this was "longer than the distance between
Washington, D.C., and Miami." The Wake airfield is unavailable at night
while lighting repairs are completed; airline officials do not expect to be
able to use it before the end of the year.

The amount of money at stake at Midway is under dispute. The Transportation
Department said the cost would run to about $6 million a year. The airlines
say that data they received from the Interior Department puts the cost of
the airfield at about $1 million when separated from other costs on the
island, which is a national wildlife refuge and includes a memorial to the
Americans who died in the historic naval engagement there in 1942. The
airfield has a simple radio navigation beacon and runway lights, but no
tower.

Duane Woerth, the president of the Air Line Pilots Association, put the cost
at $600,000 a year. "I'm really ripped about this ridiculous loss of
safety," he said. "This is an inherently governmental function. They keep
trying to outsource this inherently governmental responsibility."

Attached Graphic:

Emergency Airstrips in the Pacific

Emergency_Airstrips.gif