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By:	Chris Canfield Executive Director, Audubon North Carolina 919-929-3899 ccanfield@audubon.org

Take Action Now to defend the refuge

February 23, 2007, Chapel Hill, NC—The Navy's court-ordered Draft Supplemental EIS makes clear once again the disregard some leaders in the service have for the citizens of North Carolina and the natural treasures of the nation. They could have applied the time, energy and tax dollars that went into this Draft SEIS toward a reasonable solution that allows for safe training of its pilots. Instead, the Navy team has once again demonstrated its misguided preference for placing a jet landing field within miles of the winter home of a hundred thousand large swans, geese, and other waterbirds. This site simply won't work, no matter how many pages of rationalization are produced. Of course, the Navy has already invested millions of dollars in the Washington and Beaufort counties site, and they have, in fact, announced it as the location of the landing field in their recent budget proposal. So, it is little wonder that the study appears to be yet another attempt to justify a pre-ordained outcome.

While we will need to review the study in more detail in the coming weeks, a few points immediately call into question the methodology and conclusions of the work:

• We are certainly glad to see Site D, the location near Mattamuskeet National Wildlife Refuge, all but completely ruled out as an option due to the significant impacts to birds from operations and attempts to move the birds from the area [see 4-57 and Table 4-51]. However, their proposed Site C, right next to Pocosin Lakes NWR, somehow is claimed to be manageable. Those who know these refuges and the birds best make clear that such marked distinctions between the two locations are not possible to draw. The analysis provided for Mattamuskeet should be applied to the Pocosin location.
• The Navy's flyover tests were, by their own admissions and especially by the strong comments of USFWS experts, inconclusive, providing little real indication of the levels of disturbance birds are likely to suffer from repeated exposure to low-level take offs and landings [see 4-183+]. Interestingly, there is only one sentence regarding a pre-flight advance plane (a T-34) that buzzed the area [not mentioned at 4-183 but documented at 3-3 in “Summary of Waterfowl Noise Response Evaluations”]; yet many on the ground at the time noted its effect on snow geese on the December 7, 2005 test. The T-34 caused the snow geese to flush from the area prior to any Super Hornet overflights. No wonder they were unable to reach any real conclusions about the flights.
• If the impacts from the flight noise to birds and people will be ‘minor’ at Washington County, as the Navy study seems to claim, why did they have to call off the Hyde County overflights? They admit it was because of safety concerns for pilots due to birds and public complaints about the disruption of waterfowl hunting [see 4-176-177]. Again, the Navy fails to understand or acknowledge the direct parallels between the Hyde County and Washington County sites.
• The Navy does begin to show its true intentions with regard to eradication of birds and the drastic alteration to farming practices. Early assurances from the Navy were that it would only likely control crops in the immediate landing field area. Now they reveal plans to eliminate feed crops on as much as 22,000 acres [see 4-50-55 & Table 4-51], necessitated by the density of birds in the area. Interestingly, they simultaneously report finding no snow geese (that is, zero!) at the Site C location during the 05-06 season. During that season, US Fish and Wildlife records show a peak of 78,000 snow geese at and around the Pungo Unit, just a few miles away. It will be hard for the Navy to manage what they can't seem to find.”

For a thorough and gripping recounting of how the landing field siting process became so bungled, see “Crash Course,” a feature article by acclaimed writer Ted Williams in the November-December issue of AUDUBON magazine, available at http://magazine.audubon.org/incite/incite0611.html.

From: www.efaircraft.ene.com

Audubon is dedicated to protecting birds and other wildlife and the habitat that supports them. Our national network of community-based nature centers and chapters, scientific and educational programs, and advocacy on behalf of areas sustaining important bird populations, engage millions of people of all ages and backgrounds in positive conservation experiences.

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