Closing Miegs Field

So, because one man failed to stop a determined 15 year old the rest of us should pay? Where was the instructor and what was he doing? I wasn’t there. What do you expect flight instructors to do? Stand armed guard over every new student they take on? This teen had been in flight training some time, been an obedient and well-behaved student, and gave no indication that he was this troubled.

Give us the credit for learning from mistakes - changes have been made. New students are not permitted keys to airplanes until they solo. But at some point they have to solo. You’re making much of this teenager’s being fifteen - but if it were a month later and he was 16 (and thus legal to drive a car or fly a plane on his own) what difference would it have made? If he were 18?

Tell us, at what age do YOU think flight training should be permitted? Come on, speak up - you have so many solid opinions on everything else.

The perpetrator’s age is not nearly as important as the fact that he was suicidal - and that can happen at any age.

Actually, we’re still using many of the same materials. A gentleman at my field is building a biplane out of wood - airplane grade spruce, the same stuff they used in 1917. About the only concession to modern materials he’s made is the wing covering - I believe he’s using Ceconite instead of cotton and dope. The basic design for the Cessnas I fly dates from the late 40’s/early 50’s. The Pipers I flew are from the 1970’s. Frankly, I find the older models Cessnas to be of a sturdier construction. If my forced landing had been in the Piper I most likely would have sheared the landing gear off at the very least.

The older airplanes were considerably heavier - and that’s an important consideration. Force of impact is mass multiplied by velocity. A Stearman biplane is heavy, easily twice the weight of the airplanes I normally fly. A Stearman colliding with something at 80-100 mph is going to cause a LOT more damage than a 4-seat Cessna or Piper at the same speed - and those 4-seaters aren’t much faster than the old biplane.

I’m not entirely certain how things are in regards to gas tank placement, but the Stearman is a cloth-covered airplane, so there is less structure between the tanks and the outside world to resist rupture. The antique rag-wing planes using cotton-and-dope — well, that doping agent was notoriously flammable, which is why the darn things burned up so well. One factor in moving to metal wings was the fire resistance - it was so much harder to get a fire going, and if you did have a fire you at least had a chance to get out.

My field recently had a fire in a Cessna 150. Darn thing burned a good ten minutes before it was put out. The metal cowling and internal firewall contained it nicely - the upholstery wasn’t even singed. Mind you, that was with a full load of fuel AND the doofus who ran off in a panic didn’t even shut off the fuel lines. Try that with a WWI vintage plane you wouldn’t even have toothpicks left.

An acquaintance of mine crashed his Vari-EZE (1980’s composite design, VERY modern) into a lightpole at well over 110 mph after a forced landing. Lightpole 1, plane 0. There was no damage to the pole, and no fire. (Unfortunately, considerable damage to the pilot, but he’s back to walking again) Yes, it’s a lighter, faster, more fuel efficient 2-seat airplane than the 2-seat Stearman - and it only weighed about 500 lbs. That’s less than most motorcycles, isn’t it? Crap, I think the Stearman is over a ton - it would definitely knock over a lightpole.

To sum up - a modern small airplane has so much less mass than your 1917 biplane that in a crash the force of impact will be considerably less. AND there is far, far less chance of fire.

As I pointed out above, it’s not JUST farther and faster that counts. Birds can fly at 40 mph -when they hit a window, though, it’s usually they that get hurt, not the glass. Run a car into a window at half that speed - bye-bye window, almost no damage to car. If you’re in a car accident would you rather collide with a motorcycle or a truck? Mass can count just as much, if not more, than the speed of an object.

Even in a worst-case sceanario - a small plane landing on a road and getting into a head-on collision with a car or truck - the car/truck is MUCH more likely to survive, but the airplane will be demolished and the occupants almost certainly killed. (That’s why the guy I mentiond above opted for the lightpole rather than on-coming traffic)

It was an improved knowledge of aerodynamics that enabled the design of trainer planes that were more stable than their predecessors. With that sort of stability - which is of great aid to the new student - usually comes less agility and manuverability.

Let’s compare some things, shall we?

WWI fighters could fly upside down - try that with a Cessna the engine quits.

WWI fighters could withstand 5 or 6g’s, maybe more - they had to, in order to complete some of the dogfight manuvers. Try that in your average small general aviation airplane today you’ll snap the wings off.

WWI fighters had enormous engines, enabling them to make very tight level or climbing turns. Try that with the planes I fly you’ll either lose altitude, stall the wings, or break something. Either way, you won’t be going forward much longer.

WWI fighters - and later WWII models - had considerable horsepower. The engine gave them their speed, and the mass of that engine gave them enormous momentum. Some of the airplanes I’ve flown have been under 50 hp. They just don’t have the power to achieve much speed.

Yes, modern planes are lighter - so they can’t hit things as hard. They’re more fuel efficient - so they commonly carry less fuel. They’re much less likely to burn on impact.

Can SOME small planes perform fighter plane manuvers? Yes. In fact, the Cessna Aerobat I used to fly could, indeed, perform airshow manuvers - loops, rolls, immelmans, etc. And when I flew it above a freeway I had trouble keeping up with the cars below, they aren’t very fast at all.

Heck, the one time someone at my field taxied one of those into the side of a hangar all that happened to the hangar was scratched paint - broke the main spar of the wing, though, had to replace that half of it. Any time a small plane smacks into something at any speed the plane suffers the most damage.

For now I’ll overlook the slur of being called a liar. However, I am more than willing to state MY credentials in this discussion: I am a small plane pilot. I have been flying since 1995, primarially in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana. I have a couple hundred hours of flight time. I have flown above Chicago numerous times and am therefore famillar with the airspace and the air traffic control system in that airspace. I have been to Meigs field in person - the first time in 1983, shortly after moving to Chicago, 12 years prior to taking my first flight lesson - and thus have personal first-hand knowledge of the airport in question. Having had a forced landing, and having volunteered to help pick wrecked airplanes off crash sites, I have some first hand knowledge of what happens to airplanes when things go wrong, and what sort of damage they do and do NOT do.

On what authority do you speak, sir?

Perhaps YOU consider 15 a “child” - but that’s not “child” in the sense of 5 year old. 15 is “young man” territory. I know 15 year olds who are a foot taller than me, 100 lbs heavier. They’re also just as smart as I am, and just as fast.

As I said - at what age do YOU think flight training should occur?

A flight student, by definition, is able to touch the controls of an airplane. If the age of this person is an issue, then at what age can we trust anyone? If that’s not the issue, then the real issue is how can you tell who is going to be dangerous at the stick before they ever get into the cockpit? Any suggestions? We’d love to hear them.

KoalaBear: Why are you arguing this? You clearly have only a rudimentary understanding of the issues involved.

Let’s look at crash damage. A Cessna 150 weighs about 1100 pounds. A typical car weighs somewhere between 3000 and 4000 lbs.

But more importantly, airplanes are designed with ‘monocoque’ structures, which get their rigidity from their shape. Many cars get their strength by being built on a solid frame. That means cars punch THROUGH things, while airplanes CRUMPLE AGAINST things. That crumpling absorbs the energy.

in addition, airplanes have much greater surface area to absorb damage because of their wings. If you’ve ever seen pictures of airplanes that have hit buildings, they often penetrate up to the wings, then the wings fold back and absorb the rest of the energy, and the airplane stops.

Let me give you an example of how little damage a light airplane does - a few years ago, a local person committed suicide by flying a Cessna 172 through the front window of his ex-girlfriend’s house. This was a typical wooden-frame construction house. Photos of the crash scene showed a busted up airplane sticking out of the window. There was no fire, and no injuries other than to the pilot, who was killed. The house suffered a few thousand dollars in damage, and was patched up good as new.

On the other hand, I’ve seen cars punch their way inside stores because someone hit the gas instead of the brake while parking. A couple of decades ago there was a mass murder when a woman drove her car at high speed through an open-air mall.

This business about closing Meigs field to keep terrorists from crashing into downtown displays more ignorance. There are at least five airports near downtown Chicago - near enough that any terrorist who wanted to take off and crash into a building could do it long before any fighters could be scrambled.

But more to the point, there is a legitimate VFR corridor right by Meigs anyway. So all a terrorist would have to do would be to file a flight plan that takes him through that corridor, then veer off into downtown. The only difference Meigs offered was the ability to take off and land, and a terrorist wouldn’t want to take off from there anyway, due to the heightened security.

There is ZERO security benefit from closing Meigs, and you can argue that losing the Meigs radar makes the downtown area LESS safe.

This is very macabre, I must admit, but do you have a cite, or at least remember where it happened?

I couldn’t remember many details, but a Google search turned up this:

She was convicted, and sentenced to death. She’s still on death row today.

The caffeine hasn’t kicked in yet and I haven’t done a search, but people deliberately mowing people down with their cars has happened more than once. Several years ago a man intentionally drove his car through a group of school children here in Southern California. Before that, I remember someone doing the same thing except that this time they were adults. Just a couple of years ago a college student in Santa Barbara (I think) decided to plow through a group of people and there was amateur video of the crowd chasing him down and holding him for the police. (IIRC, he was the son of some Hollywood bigshot.) Although I don’t have the numbers available, I’d bet that more people have been killed by people intentionally driving their cars into crowds than have been killed by people flying General Aviation aircraft into buildings.

I see two possibilities. Either KoalaBear actually believes there is a threat and is unable to comprehend the evidence that shows it is not; or he/she has a hatred of “little airplanes” and is being deliberately obtuse on the matter. He/she has not offered any evidence that GA is a threat, but instead says something “might” happen or that the threat is “obvious”. That’s not evidence, but speculation.

From this site:

It has been ever thus with those who attack General Aviation and other endeavors.

Unfortunately it ever will be the bane of our lives. Education, Education, Education … and finally

*. Uh, does anyone know where Uncle Vinne is ? *

A determined 15 year old? As if the instructor resisted with all his might when in fact he was AWOL?

If minimum solo age is 16, that would be a good time to progress beyond the simulator to a real airplane, don’t you think? If it’s not a pilot’s responsibility to be a babysitter, they shouldn’t provide flight instruction to minors.

The crux of the issue is whether you’ve got the balls to admit when a mistake has been made, particularly with respect to safety and security, and you don’t. Every time the question has been raised you’ve hemmed and hawed and distributed responsibility for the incident everywhere except where it belongs.

That was not my intention, but if the shoe fits…

Upon the evidence of your own testimony, ma’am, which has been[ul][li]hateful (“Mayor Daley is a liar, a fraud, a cheat, and a crook. He has done such a rotten thing here, that all the good he may have done so far is erased.”), [/li][li]alarmist (“go ahead - believe the fairy tales the Mayor tells you, that you’re somehow safer now. YOU ARE NOT!”), [/li][li]specious (“How much of your liberty are you willing to yield in pursuit of an impossible goal?”), [/li][li]threatening (“There are 700,000 active licensed pilots in the US - and they are very, very angry right now. All of them.”), [/li][li]exaggerated (“imagine you’re having health problems, you get an appointment with your doctor, and… he has to cancel because some self-important politician 300 miles away has impounded your doctor’s means of transportation.”), [/li][li]evasive (“Sure… scapegoat pilots and airplanes… but ignore the possibility of car and truck bombs and boats full of C4”), and[/li][li]melodramatic (“But, of course, the lives and safety of pilots don’t matter to King Daley.”)[/ul]---------[/li] Let me cordially invite these 700,000 angry pilots to lick Chicago’s 2,896,016 fudgy sphincters. No need to be greedy – there’s more than four for each of you.

I believe the decision to close Meigs was the correct one, but I’m open to the possibility it was not. That being said, I wasn’t aware I needed your approval to participate.

That’s a fallacious argument, known as a straw man: define “terror risk” to mean “frontal assault on a skyscraper,” handily disprove that scenario, then declare you’ve proven there is no terror risk.

In reality, a “terror risk” encompasses a spectrum of threat, including but not limited to a strike on the spectators at Soldier Field or a chemical or biological attack, neither of which are nullified by monococque construction or impact-absorbent surface areas.

Though landing fees have been increased, it would be naive to assume that the City operates the airport at anything resembling a profit. Good security doesn’t come cheap, and the word “airport” belies the fact that it’s a tiny little airstrip with insignificant traffic whose coup de gras happens to be its spectacularly convenient location.

If the terror risk is slighter than the public fears, it’s also greater than the aviation community will admit. If you adjust for spin and split the difference, the risk is well above zero, with the City of Chicago in the lose-lose position of having to provide effective security to counter that threat in addition to being responsible for the outcome if it fails.

Meigs was a phenomenally desirable private luxury to which the aviation community felt less grateful for than entitled to, even though the airfield provided no benefit to the average Chicagoan whatsoever. Why should the City finance, operate, maintain and secure a facility that is almost exclusively to the benefit of non-residents?

If we can take an El ride from Midway or O’Hare to the museum campus, so can you.

Primary flight training is not done on simulators. Attempting to learn to fly on a simulator would be foolish.

The risk is extremely small. You haven’t provided any evidence that General Aviation is a threat; only “possibilities” that have been shown several times to be unlikely or false.

So are you opposed to everything from which you do not personally benefit? I don’t have kids, and yet I still pay taxes to support our schools. I have a job, and yet I help support jobless people and have volunteered to help build houses for them. Some people have no use for art or music, and yet museums and concert areas are often supported by public funds. Should motorcyclists be banned from HOV lanes because they nearly always are ridden by a single rider? “Why should they get to use the HOV lane, when I can’t?” :rolleyes:

You know nothing about aviation. You have little grasp of the weapons used by terrorists. You support the closing of public-use property by claiming it’s a “terror threat!” when it has been made clear that it isn’t. You have demanded that we give you evidence that General Aviation is not a threat, which was given. (Light aircraft are unsuited for use as effective terrorist weapons. They don’t carry enough fuel to cause fires such as seen at the WTC. They require a level of training that is impractical for most terrorists. Much larger aircraft have hit buildings without causing significant damage. Cessnas that were deliberately flown into buildings caused little damage – not even fires. Closing airspace would have had no effect on those very few incidents when a light-plane pilot did intentionally fly his airplane into a building. Light aircraft lack the mass to cause serious damage. Need I go on?) But when we ask you to provide evidence to the contrary, you are strangely silent.

This is not a rhetorical question: Do you really believe small aircraft are terror threats? If yes, then give actual evidence that they are. If not, then please admit that you just don’t like “little airplanes” and stop trying to use “security” as an excuse.

So how does the FAA closing the tower early figure into all of this?

I don’t know if this has been posted before, but here are some relevant addresses if you want to speak your mind:

Office of the Mayor
121 N. LaSalle, Room 507
Chicago, IL 60602
FAX: 312-744-8045

And two e-mail addresses of interest:

Mayor Richard M. Daley at mayordaley@cityofchicago.org or Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich at governor@state.il.us

You don’t need my approval. I was just curious why someone would hold such a strong opinion on an issue they know nothing about.

Well, it’s hard to refute your supposed terror threat, because you haven’t provided one. Since you feel so strongly that Meigs should have been closed for security purposes, please give us a hypothetical scenario for a terror risk that has abated now that Meigs has closed. If you can’t do that, then how can you make the claim that closing the airport improves security? On what basis?

Wow. Let me get this straight - we say there was no risk. You say there was, but you have no idea what it might be. So, you want to ‘split the difference’ and have us admit that there was some kind of extra risk, and therefore the closure was reasonable? What kind of logic is that?

I think baby pacifiers are a huge terrorist risk. They should be banned. I don’t know exactly what the risk is, but there must be one. If you don’t agree, then let’s split the difference and admit the pacifier/terrrorist is greater than zero. On that basis, I think all baby pacifiers should be banned.

And finally, we have the REAL argument. This isn’t about terrorism at all, is it? It’s about class warfare. YOU don’t use general aviation airports, so YOU shouldn’t have to support them, look at them, etc. Therefore, you support banning them.

The problem is that you don’t have a clue about the benefits that accrue from general aviation, and how important having an infrastructure of small airports is. They are a boon to small business, which helps the economy. The provide training for airline pilots. They inspire young people, which causes those people to work harder in school and study the sciences. They are a symbol of freedom. They provide emergency services, search and rescue services, facilities for air traffic helicopters and small aircraft used for things like pipeline inspection or survey work.

Any society with a large government has some services paid for that not all of the population uses, because it is recognized that a society with those services are worthwhile. If Joe Redneck doesn’t watch PBS, why should his tax dollars pay to fund it? Why should New York taxpayers have to pay for the Metripolitan Opera, when only a small percentage attend? How about Wrigley Field? Any tax money in that? How do you think non-baseball fans feel about it?

Any society with a large government has some services paid for that not all of the population uses, because it is recognized that a society with those services are worthwhile. If Joe Redneck doesn’t watch PBS, why should his tax dollars pay to fund it? Why should New York taxpayers have to pay for the Metripolitan Opera, when only a small percentage attend? How about Wrigley Field? Any tax money in that? How do you think non-baseball fans feel about it? **
[/QUOTE]

Most of GA would and could pay for itself through the fuel tax imposed by the government on 100LL (aviation fuel for small planes). Very simple, very elegant solution that generates revenue in proportion to the size of plane and the extent that it uses the system. AOPA has lobbied for years to do exactly this…

BUT the gummint uses it for “general purposes” and has recently hinted on more than one occasion that it wants to impose additional user fees for using GA infrastructure.

Just got back from vacation, so I’m a little late for this discussion.

Just wanted to add that I work downtown and can see Meigs from my window. I run an average of 4 days per week, and 2 of my favorite routes take me right past Meigs - either out the peninsula around the planetarium, or south along the bike path past McCormick down towards 31st. On really hot days, we will take a dip in the lake at the beach on Northerly Island (14th St?). Both of these routes take me through considerable portions of Grant Park as well.

As a very frequent user of this area, it is my personal experience and opinion that these parks are vastly underutilized, and that there is absolutely NO need for additional parkland in the area. The ONLY congestion occurs during festivals such as Taste of Chicago, or the various music fests.

Moreover, the VAST amount of usage occurs north of the museum campuses. As you get south of Roosevelt (past the Field and towars Soldier Field and McCormick) you have the place to yourself on nearly every day of the year. There is considerable open space immediately south of McCormick, which received considerable lanscaping last year. I am nearly always the only person within eyesight in the area.

If you do not personally frequent this area, make sure you are not equating it with the mobscene up north around Lincoln Park.

The pedestrians I DO see - either on the peninsula or in front of McCormick, seem most interested in watching the planes take off and land. I fondly remember the sight of plane traffic on the lakefront from my youth.

Note that I say this as one of the persons who will most likely benefit most from the creation of more paths on what used to be Meigs.

You’re suggesting Meigs should remain open as a gesture of charity? That it’s our humanitarian duty to provide you the ultimate in convenience and luxury?

The characterization of light aircraft as fireproof and soft as a down pillow isn’t a persuasive argument to me.

The airport was closed because it was a terror risk. If you don’t think that’s a valid reason, it’s up to you to construct a persuasive argument to the contrary.

All of them.

Here’s one, and it’s apparently quite the stumper: if experienced flight instructors are sometimes unable to keep aircraft out of the hands of mentally deranged minors, would they be 100% effective against bona fide adult terrorists?

It’s about choosing between public safety and private interests. By your own estimates there are at least fourteen alternative airports in the metropolitan area; if they’re not good enough for you, well, tough shit.

Perhaps it’s a matter of choosing more contemporary works rather than a strict adherence to the classics. I mean, Webber and Rice’s Evita isn’t an opera, but the fact that it’s performed in English is likely to sell a lot more tickets than anything performed in Italian, wouldn’t you say?

No, I’m saying that there are things that are good for societies that are paid for by people who don’t use them. How many people’s houses have burnt down? They still support the fire department.

First of all, I never said any such thing. Please refrain from putting words in my mouth. Secondly, your statement does nothing to counter the many arguments I and others have listed. Not only that, it is non-sensical. It’s as if we had had this exchange:

Us: “We gave you evidence that General Aviation is not a significant threat.”

You: “I like pie.”

Wrong! It is up to the people who claim there is a terror risk to prove there is a terror risk. Not the other way around.

“Why are you wearing a popsicle around your neck?”
“It keeps the tigers away.”
“There are no tigers here.”
“See how well it works?”

It is up to you, KoalaBear to provide evidence that there are tigers to begin with.

:rolleyes: I’m rolling my eyes because your answer is not an answer. You were asked to “a hypothetical scenario for a terror risk that has abated now that Meigs has closed.”

Provide one.

No, there is no threat to public safety that has been averted by the closing of Meigs Field! At least, you have not shown us any – in spite of multiple requests to do so.

It doesn’t matter what’s playing. What matters is that the Arts often receive public funds, while very few of the public actually use the facilities.

I’ve asked more than once, as have others, so I don’t suppose it will do any good. What evidence can you give us that closing Meigs Field provides any protection against terror? What evidence do you have that light aircraft provide any significant threat to public safety?

Thanks for the recent post, Johnny. This was the kind of thing I was getting at in a recent IMHO thread I posted about fear.

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=175607

Don’t you feel a lot safer, now that you have to take your shoes off before boarding a plane? And then I read that they are discussing bulletproof cockpit doors. Does it EVER become overkill?

If you wish to, you can consider just about anything a threat. I hate to sound cynical, but I suspect Daley is not the only person using such fear to accomplish their political objectives.

And those promoting increased security measures will present to nothing more or less than your remaining alive as sufficient proof of the necessity of their measures.

Say, where do I get one of them popsicles? I’ve been worried about tigers lately…

Actually, the ‘L’ is a major terror risk that needs to be shut down immediately.

If you disagree, please prove why the ‘L’ isn’t a terror risk. Or how the benefits, whatever they are, of the ‘L’ trains outweigts the tremendous human cost that could result from someone using them as a vehicle for a terror attack.

-Christian

Oh, yes - the subway is definitely a terror risk. Remember the sarin attack in the Tokyo subway? Or the derranged man in Korean recently who started a fire that killed - what was it, dozens or hundreds?

Take note, KoalaBear - there is past experience that subways are vulnerable to attack. There is NO past experience of light planes doing significant damage to skyscrapers.

That’s a good question, lee.

A small plane such as the Bonanza (the last plane to leave) does not require a control tower to make a safe take-off. Since there was no other traffic at the airport at the time of take-off it was reasonably safe for a single airplane to take off. Quite different than when the airport was open and may have had several airplanes in the immediate vicinity of the field. The pilot would simply climb on a pre-determined path until he came within range of the ATC radar operated from O’Hare, Midway, or Elgin.

The fact that the owner of the airplane had hired a commercial pilot to ferry his airplane back to St. Louis may have been an additional factor, as the (presumably) greater skills of a commercial pilot vs. a private pilot may have been judged to further reduce the risk of no-tower take-off in that vicinity.