COLCHESTER — Basing the F-35 fighter jet at Burlington International Airport will enable the Vermont Air National Guard to continue to serve national and state emergency needs, Guard officials said Thursday.
Speaking at an invitation-only roundtable discussion with the media at Vermont National Guard headquarters at Camp Johnson, Lt. Col. Luke “Torch” Ahmann, 158 Fighter Wing Plans and F-35 Program Integration Officer for the Air Guard, said the state needs the F-35.
“The future is basically unknown, that’s part of the risk of not bringing the F-35 here,” Ahmann said. “There is no plan to upgrade the F-16s that we have here.”
He said there are no mission alternatives that would involve personnel on the ground for the 1,100 men and women serving in the Vermont Guard.
The session was held following the release last week of a revised Air Force environmental impact statement that said more people will be affected by noise from the next-generation planes. The Vermont Air Guard is competing with five other bases around the country to host up to 24 F-35 fighters to replace the current fleet of aging F-16s.
There are approximately 400 full-time and 700 part-time Guard employees at the base, amounting to $53 million in annual payroll. Officials at the Air National Guard estimated about 80 percent of those employees are from Vermont.
Ahmann said locating the F-35s elsewhere would drastically reduce the footprint of the Air National Guard in the area. While some bases are planning to upgrade and retrofit the F-16, the Vermont base is not.
“There is only a limited number that they are planning to do that with,” he said.
Brig. Gen. Richard Harris, assistant adjutant general for the Vermont Air Guard, confirmed that F-16 program is going to end. Harris is unaware of any other mission alternative for the Air National Guard.
“This process is about going from one plane to another,” Harris said.
Addressing the noise factor
“We feel strongly we can mitigate the impact on the community by working with the community on the noise piece,” Harris said. “Based on the information I have, I would say that it is going to be similar to the annoyances and impacts that we have been having with the F-16 in the last 25 years.”
Ahmann said noise estimates in the environmental impact statement are conservative.
Though the EIS states that afterburners will be used 5 percent of the time, Ahmann expects the F-35 will not need afterburners because the high performance jet is capable of taking off without them.
He said that the jet has taken off in other testing locations without afterburners with full fuel and ammunition loads, which the jets in Burlington will not always need to carry.
This will reduce the weight and drag of the jet as compared to the F-16, which uses afterburners more than 90 percent of the time because it carries two gasoline tanks under its wings. These tanks are heavy and not aerodynamic, Ahmann said.
He said the jet will be quieter than the F-16 after it takes off. He said the Guard tested the sound of the plane at 22 locations in the area. In seven of the 22 locations the jet was quieter than the F-16. In 20 of the 22 locations, the change in sound was imperceptible to the human ear, Ahmann said.
The two locations with perceivable noise increases include the Center for Science Education in Williston, which increased 6 decibels from the baseline noise level, and Williston Road at South Brownell Road, which increased 7 decibels. This information is located on page BR 4-30 in the EIS.
Ahmann said the Air National Guard is taking steps to reduce noise by alter the jet’s ground track (i.e. where it flies), reduce its power for takeoff and accelerate to a higher altitudes faster.
The other side
Rosanne Greco, a retired Air Force colonel and opponent of the F-35 who lives in South Burlington, disputes Ahmann’s noise assessment.
Greco said his claims are largely subjective and are inconsistent with the scientific research released by the Air Force in the EIS.
“The Air Force wants to find a home for this, they are just putting the facts out,” Greco said. “There is a bias with the Guard. They want it to come here. That might color their assessment.”
Greco cited Table 6-7 in the EIS, which states that the F-35 will be about 20 decibels louder than the F-16.
“These are the laws of nature in physics,” she said. “I just got to tell you, if anybody is going to take one person’s opinion over scientific research, let’s talk about the world being flat again.”
She said that the Guard predicted that the F-16s would become quieter in 2006.
“It didn’t become quieter, it became louder. They were wrong in their assessment,” Greco said. “The people that are telling us that this is going to get quieter were the very same people that told us that the F-16 was going to get quieter. And they were wrong.”
She said that even though the Guard proposes noise mitigation procedures, such as flying higher and changing its path, this will not prevent the jet from making noise during takeoff.
“You have to get off the ground,” Greco said. “The loudest noise is during takeoff.”
She also said the Guard has other options besides adopting the F-35.
Greco said the lifetime of the F-16 can be extended and that the mission of the Guard can change without using fighter jets. For example, she said cyber security could be the Guard’s future mission.
“The Air Force is coming out almost every week to take up cyber security as a mission,” Greco said. “That’s our greatest threat right now. What we do need is protection against terrorism and cyber.”
Greco also said national security missions do not require fighter jets as they have in the past. She said the jet will become even more obsolete in 2030 because future national security threats cannot be countered with a fighter jet.
“We used to fight wars with muskets, we don’t do that anymore,” Greco said. “The world is moving.”
She said that the jet does not support Vermont’s security needs; personnel on the ground help residents during natural disasters.
“The F-35 is not going to do anything for the state of Vermont,” Greco said. “When the next Hurricane Irene comes in, you’re going to call in the F-35 and they are going to do what?”
Public input
As a member of the South Burlington City Council, Greco said that she is concerned that the 7,000 people that would be affected by the noise will not have the ability to speak out, such as low-income residents, refugees and children.
“Rich people do not live around the airport. That’s where affordable housing is,” Greco said. “Nobody seems to be paying any attention to them. Lets talk about the people.”
She added that the only way to challenge concerns with the F-35 after it arrives to Burlington is through an expensive lawsuit against the Air Force.
“Once the F-35 comes here, you can’t do anything about it. The citizens are stuck with it,” Greco said. “Once is comes here, there is no going back.”
Adam Wright, environmental manager for the Vermont National Guard, said that the Guard will listen to the public’s concerns if there are issues with the F-35.
He said if the jet needs to use more afterburner than is expected, the Vermont Air Guard will conduct a public vetting process to hear the community’s concerns with any issues.
According to Wright, after the record of decision is made, the Air Combat Command, which reports to the U.S. Air Force, will put comments together and respond to the community’s concerns. The command will then present a report to senior leaders at the Air Force.
“That’s where something like this could be vetted right away. So that would be done with a little public involvement,” Wright said. “It isn’t like we say this is what you get and then there would be a switch.”
Why Burlington?
In October 2009, the U.S. Air Force selected Vermont as the location for the F-35 out of 10 finalists based on a list of criteria that ranked the locations based on their ability to accommodate the F-35 fighter jet.
The mission factor accounts for 60 percent of the score. Mission is broken down into weather conditions, 5 points, and airspace ability, 55 points, which Burlington probably scored well in because of its existing base for the F-16, Ahmann said.
According the F-35 Operational Beddown Criteria, the other three factors are cost, five points, capacity, 25 points, and environmental impact, 10 points.
A factor not included in the Operational Beddown Criteria is military judgment. This factor gauges the location’s ability to meet national security needs and the cost of updating existing F-16s as compared to one-to-one replacement with of the F-35s.
Officials at the Vermont Air National Guard say they don’t know how each of these factors are later weighted.
