We take air safety for granted - a few links

When you are aware of air safety it's suprising how often you notice it in the media.
While I am sure there is considerable effort expended to decrease airpalne crashes, the reality is that when there's an engine failure, the drop to the ground.
I just don't want them flying over head when there's have a problem.

Here's a few links:
American Airlines Pilot fails drunk test prior to flight
Southwest Airlines - Tire Fire at KHOU

The pilot of a doomed plane that crashed, killing 50 people, said "Jesus Christ" and "We're down," seconds before the plane hurtled from the night sky into a house outside Buffalo, New York, in February.
Screams, 'We're down,' recorded in cockpit of crashing plane

Video of wheel falling off Q-400 A terrifying moment was captured on tape by a passenger as a Continental Airlines flight landed at Buffalo International Airport on May 12.

Airplane crash fatalities leave Loma Linda University reeling | Riverside | PE.com | Southern California News | News for Inland Southern California

A 23-year-old student and 28-year-old flight instructor were flying the Cessna 152 in an area around the Glendale Municipal Airport when they reported engine trouble,
http://www.azcentral.com/community/phoenix/articles/2009/04/15/20090415forced-landing0415.html#comments

MOST RECENT NEWS/ACTIONS FROM OUR GROUP

The recent discussion in the media regarding the public funding of the Buttonville airport has triggered a group of residents to share their concerns about the airport. We find that the resident communities’ voice is not well represented and most concerns with the airport operation have not been addressed by the airport owner (Refer to Section "About Us and Our Concerns" for the list of concerns).

The intent of our group's action is to share information and issues, and provide information on actions that can be taken to affect the airport operation. If there is support for change, we can organize as a coherent voice representing the concerned residents.

Recently, our group has written several letters to GTAA, our government representatives, and news media regarding:

• Our safety concern on lack of open fields for aircraft emergency landing
• Our concern for lack of plan to relocate Buttonville Airport away from densely populated communities.
• Our objection to resume/continue public funding (both from GTAA and York Region) for the privately owned Buttonville Airport. We believe users of the airport should pay instead of asking for public money.
  

We have also started a letter (email) campaign to the various Ratepayers Associations informing them of the recent events and asking for their support and involvement of their residents.

Furthermore, we have drafted a letter for residents that have similar concerns to use. A copy can be found in our "Sample Letter" section in this blog. Should you support the concerns, you may consider to do one of the following:

1) Write your own letter and send/email it to the parties involved

2) Use our drafted letter and email to the parties involved

3) Join the “people petition” by sending an email to us at ButtonvilleNoiseAndSafety@gmail.com and say “yes, I share similar concerns regarding Buttonville airport and I would like to join the group petition email letter to be sent to the parties involved". Please provide your name, your address, your email or phone contact as this information is required to submit the group petition. Any information provided is solely used for the petition and for group communication on this particular topic only. The parties involved are listed in our "Sample Letter" section.

As the airport operation affects all communities in vicinity, we are in the process of setting up a group (ButtonvilleNoiseAndSafety) that will represent the community voice on the operation of the airport that affects our daily lives and our safety. If you are interested to join our group and be informed of what’s happening on the airport, just send us an email at ButtonvilleNoiseAndSafety@gmail.com expressing your interest to join the group and we will contact you with further information.

As we are not able at this time to contact all residents living in vicinity, please help us to inform your neighbours and friends about:

1. Information and concerns on Buttonville airport operation
2. The letter (email) campaign to GTAA and our Government Representatives on our concerns
3. The set up of our group "ButtonvilleNoiseAndSafety" and our blog - http://ButtonvilleNoiseAndSafety.blogspot.com/

Only by working together, we can strive for a better environment for all of us. Be involved and have some say on airport operation that affects all of us living in vicinity of the airport in terms of safety, noise and pollution.

ButtonvilleNoiseAndSafety Group

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Buttonville flight statistics/Why we should be concerned

Over the years, the areas surrounding Buttonville have changed significantly. What was once empty field are now densely populated communities where we live and work, where our children go to school. There is now hardly any open field or unoccupied space for emergency landing of aircrafts. The operation of Buttonville airport, especially one where 50% of the flights are for training pilots and for pleasure use with older single-engine aircrafts, leads one to be concerned about suitability of the airport given the density of today’s development and that which is planned for the future. Simply put, if a single-engine aircraft loses power, it will crash into a home, or school, or office in our neighbourhood as there is hardly any open fields in vicinity for emergency landing. It is a known fact that a high percentage of aircraft accidents happen during airport take off or landing.

Perhaps the following statistics may help to better understand the safety issue and the need to relocate the airport away from densely populated communities. Buttonville had 163994 aircraft movements in 2008 (aircraft take offs and landings, Statcan, NAV Canada tower), averaging 449 movements a day, composed of 80001(48.8%) Itinerant and 83993 (51.2%) local traffic. If we took the summer months from May to October, the average number was 552 movements a day with similar composition, and the peak hour occurrence was about 112 and peak day traffic about 1047. Furthermore, all the statistics quoted did not take into account the circulating activities of large number of training/pleasure flights that could easily multiply the air traffic many times. The frequency of these flights with the use of older single engine planes and with hardly any open field in vicinity for emergency landing is a disaster in the making. Postponement in relocating Buttonville and accepting the increased risk of crash landings and fatalities as an inevitable part of our future is plainly irresponsible.