Federal Aviation Administration responds to Federal Way’s aircraft noise questions

Published 8:00 am Monday, March 28, 2016

It appears the Federal Aviation Administration can’t do much about the aircraft noise in Federal Way, according to several answers officials provided to questions Federal Way city officials sent months ago.

At least not yet.

“It’s still a work in progress,” said Federal Way Chief of Staff Brian Wilson, adding that there’s a meeting between the city and the FAA scheduled at the end of March to work on the aircraft noise issues and get clarification on some of the administration’s responses.

After a November 2015 community meeting with Mayor Jim Ferrell, the city identified common themes and concerns Federal Wayans had about noisy airplanes. The city then submitted about 15 questions to the FAA.

These themes included addressing whether Federal Way could “share” the noise load with other areas, if the administration had utilized “optimized profile descents” as much as possible, whether the south end of the Puget Sound region was getting a fair deal when it came to departures, if there had been any changes to routes, the military’s role in noise and if changes were at all possible.

According to the FAA, fanning out departures so they aren’t always going over the same point isn’t currently possible. The city had asked if there were different points after takeoff when aircraft could turn into their flight routes, but administration officials said making such changes would “cause a safety hazard for the air traffic controllers and potential environmental impacts to the community.”

In fact, “any proposed procedural changes need to be submitted to the FAA Instrument Flight Procedure Gateway,” a process the administration follows to evaluate for feasibility, fly-ability, environmental impacts and whether public outreach is necessary.

This was a response to other questions, including whether the policy could change for airplanes departing and arriving in the south end of the region, which had different policies for aircraft coming from the north end.

In 1990, procedures were developed for safety and efficiency, which resulted in a “Record of Decision.” That decision included noise abatement for flight departures headed north (north flow) but not for those departing to the south (south flow).

Submitting procedural changes to the FAA Instrument Flight Procedure Gateway was also the answer to whether aircraft departing to the south could take advantage of water or industrial zones to mitigate noise disturbance. It was also the answer to what options are available to mitigate noise issues that would not prompt a new environmental review. And it was also the answer to whether there’s flexibility to make changes in the south end that were within the scope of the current environmental review.

“Moving flight paths will only be done for safety or stringent efficiency reasons (efficiency being the capacity of the system, not the efficiency of individual users), and not to move noise from one place to another,” said one response.

Ultimately, FAA officials said about 65 percent of all departures go south because of the runway configuration and weather, specifically wind flow.

“When wind is above 8 knots, south flow is utilized for the safety of the aircraft,” the FAA stated.

With wind being the greatest factor, aircraft are certified with a tailwind component, which, along with wind, controls the direction an airplane can safely land or depart. Because Boeing Field and the SeaTac airport are “operationally dependent on one another,” the administration chose the flow that aligns both airports – the south flow.

Visibility is also a factor, they said. Because the south end has more fog and light winds, SeaTac has the “greatest precision navigational equipment on the south side of the airport to ensure safe operations in a south flow.” The north flow doesn’t have that equipment.

And while departure procedures haven’t changed since 1990, departures aren’t as high in the sky as they used to be. The FAA said departures are flying 3 percent lower when comparing statistics taken in July 2014-2015 and November 2014-2015.

“However, the procedures are being flown as designed and published, and aircraft are complying with all required restrictions,” the administration stated. “The FAA doesn’t determine how an aircraft is flown, as that is done by the pilot based on several operational factors including aircraft weight and weather.”

The FAA suggested people should contact local stakeholders, including the airport or airlines, if they wanted more information on that issue.

The city of Federal Way started receiving citizen complaints regarding airplane noise in May 2015. Most of the complainants said then that they perceived an increase in noise from take-offs and landings from the SeaTac airport. They also said there were changes in flight patterns, lower elevation levels for aircraft over neighborhoods, and an increase in the total number of flights.

And it was worse in the summer.

Wilson said the city met with the SeaTac airport officials in July 2015 and discovered the main runway was under construction from April to October 2015, which was pushing flights to other runways. Because the summer months were warmer and there was more north wind, noise and air traffic were more noticeable. The airport had also increased flights by 13.4 percent that summer compared to the last, and the airport was one of the fastest-growing of the top 20 airports in the United States.

But the noise continued past October, and the city hosted the community meeting the following month. Between fall and summer, officials had spoken with U.S. Sen. Patty Murray and U.S. Rep. Adam Smith about the problem. There was also another meeting with Port of Seattle CEO Theodore Fick and the Port’s Director of Real Estate and Economic Development Jeffrey Utter this January. After ongoing discussions with Diane Fuller, the senior adviser of the office of the regional administrator for the Federal Aviation Administration, the city was given their responses. Those responses were sent out to residents who attended the November 2015 community meeting.

The follow-up meeting with the Federal Aviation Administration is scheduled for the week of March 28.

For more information about flight patterns, visit “Public Vue, Noise Programs” on the Port of Seattle website. For direct questions, email Linda Stewart, the director of community partnerships for the Port of Seattle, at stewart.l@portofseattle.org.