The Navy has agreed to look at six alternative sites in North Carolina for a practice airfield it has been wanting to build near a wildlife refuge in the eastern part of the state.
The sites, which state officials asked the Navy to consider, include two in Gates County and two in Camden County in northeastern North Carolina. Those sites are near the Naval Air Station Oceana in Virginia Beach, Va., where most of the squadrons using the landing field would be based, reports Wade Rawlins.
Also on the list: a site at the Angola Bay gameland, on the border of Pender and Duplin counties, and a site at Hofmann Forest, on the border of Jones and Onslow counties. Those two sites are in southeastern North Carolina.
State environmental officials and Navy representatives made a joint presentation today regarding the sites to an advisory committee appointed by Gov. Mike Easley.
Navy officials plan to review the alternatives and decide within the next 60 days whether to do in- depth environmental studies of any of them.
Read more after the jump.
–––––
The Navy has sought to build the jetway on a site between existing bases at Oceana and Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point near Havelock. Squadrons of F/A-18 Super Hornets would use the remote runway to simulate night landings on aircraft carrier landings.
The Navy's first choice for the practice airstrip, estimated to cost $230 million, is on 30,000 acres in Washington and Beaufort counties, near Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge, which attracts tens of thousands of migratory birds each year. The Navy has bought about 2,000 acres at that location.
But the site has encountered opposition from conservation groups, political leaders and the local communities because of its proximity to the national wildlife refuge and its disruption to the agricultural community. Opposition from Easley and the state's congressional delegation has forced the Navy to reconsider its options.
Blog RSS feed
