Tucson Forward

ARTICLE ON OPERATION SNOWBIRD CAUSES A FLURRY OF LETTERS

Dave Devine’s article Noise Vs. Jobs of June 30, 2011 on Operation Snowbird started a series of letters to The Tucson Weekly’s “Mailbag”.

July 14, 2011 Letter from Robin Gomez

July 21, 2011 Letter from James Collins

August 4, 2011 Letter from Charles W. Walker with headline “That’s Not Airplane Noise; It’s the Sound of Freedom” in response to James Collins’ letter.

Below are two letters written in response Mr. Walker’s letter:

Tucson Weekly Mailbag September 1-7, 2011

Military Plane Crashes Can and Do Happen

I would like to respond to Charles Walker’s response: “ That’s Not Airplane Noise; It’s the Sound of Freedom” ( Mailbag August 4, 2011).

I was very happy to read that Mr. Walker and the community he lived in never experienced a military jet crash. However, mechanical problems and pilot errors are inevitable. Each jet type has a statistical accident rate. In the 2004 Joint Land Use Study it was reported that while military jet accidents over populated areas are infrequent, they tend to be catastrophic.

Mr. Walker’s community never experienced one of those catastrophes. However, Tucson has experienced many. In 1959 a female bicyclist was killed by falling debris from a passing jet. In 1967 an F4D Phantom slammed into a Food Giant supermarket at 29th and
Alvernon, killing three women in the market and a teen age girl in her home. In 1978 a single-engine A-7 crashed at the intersection of Highland Avenue and Sixth Street, just missing the U of A and Mansfeld Middle School, incinerating two young students.

After the 1978 tragedy, a letter from the US Air Force outlined a plan to minimize such tragedies. The mission was changed to A-10s (less loud, safer, double engine jets) and National Guard activity was transferred to Tucson International Airport.

The 1978 crash and the subsequent DM mission change are proof positive that a catastrophic crash can happen. It also demonstrated that the Air Force can make changes that support the community’s need for quality of life and safety.

Jean de Jong

Tucson Weekly Mailbag August 11, 2011

That’s the Sound of a Dying Empire, Not Freedom

I would like to respond to Charles Walker’s letter (“That’s Not Airplane Noise; It’s the Sound of Freedom!” Aug. 4).

I guess Mr. Walker missed the debt/deficit “crisis” and the economic collapse caused by dozens of unfunded wars and the posting of American legions of occupation all over the world.

He also seems to have missed the facts of peak oil and global climate destabilization caused by overuse of fossil fuels. The Pentagon is the No.1 consumer of U.S. petroleum.

It also seems to have escaped his notice that the F-35s he’s defending are overpriced boondoggles designed to fight the F-16s the United States has supplied to others while lining the pockets of Lockheed, etc. Or that the military-industrial complex will be selling these planes below cost to other countries.

When I hear military jets overhead, I hear the dying blasts of the end of the age of cheap fossil fuels coupled with the financial and moral bankrupting of our society by the Permanent War Economy.

Chet Gardiner