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I'm not sure how many people in the Mobile/Baldwin county area are aware of the Naval flight training being carried out at the Bay Minette Municipal Airport. The training flights have been going on for months now but i have never seen anything on the News about this. The problems i have with the contract between Skywarriors. Inc. and the Navy are as followed: 1.The Military base closures in the Pensacola area did not close any bases but did cut jobs.
2.There are no civilian or any other air controllers based at the Bay Minette Municipal Airport.
3.There is no firefighting equipment there in case of a crash. This is cadet training so it would follow that these pilots might have limited flight experience.
4.The airfield in Bay Minette is classified for public use by the FAA but the Navy training has taken over.
5.Although the airport is in Bay Minette and the contract with the lessees of the facilities was made with the Bay Minette City council and the Mayor of the City, the planes do their training flights following fixed flight paths over White House Fork where i live.
6.On  recent  occasions there were in excess of 200 flights daily  over my house with at least 2 planes in the air at all times.
7. I have requested  assistance   from the Governor, County Commissioners, Congressman Jo Bonner  and  Senator  Jeff  Sessions  with no help from any at this point.
I would like to know if others in the area affected by the noise of these planes feel the same way i do  i  know  some  do.   The Navy still has its  bases in Florida and can do their training there, over the Gulf, the River delta or over the City  of  Bay Minette  who benefits  monetarily from these contracts.
Today  its  my  constitutional  rights  being  violated;  tomorrow  it  may  well  be  yours.

We have had the same problem in the Fairhope area. There is a training field near Silverhill and they fly over us to the bay. Back in the late 1990s it got really bad(several crashes too) and we peppered the politicians with complaints!! There is a sizable population who will call you anti-American when you complain!(especially retired pilots!) The whole operation needs to be moved to the desert in Arizona or Ca. but apparently it creates jobs in Pensacola!!(Whiting Field) Believe me this is not a new problem.

You live in an area called "The Cradle of Naval Aviation"......The Navy  has trained all around this area for 70 years. Thousands of people make thier living maintaining and flying these aircraft all over the Gulf Coast.......To wish the military would go to CA or AZ is just an uneducated and silly remark.

I  lived  in  the  Fairhope  for  over  50  years  and  just  moved  to  Bay  Minette  2  years  ago,   so  i  know  about  previous  training  going  back  to  Barin  Field  and  Silverhill.  The  old  T-28  trainers  they  used  back  then  didn't  make  one  tenth  of  the  noise  the  new  ones  do.  The  Navy  has  never  used  public  airfields  in  this  area  for  training  bases.  Barin  Field  and  Silverhill  were  and  are  military  bases  as  far  as  i  know.  During  the  base  realignment  civil  service  employees  were  retired  or  moved  to  other  bases  but  none  of  the  bases  up  for  closure  were  actually  shut  down,  only  jobs.
Since  you  use  the  phrase, "the  Cradle  of  Naval  Aviation",  you  may  have  trained  with  the  Navy  or  retired  from  one  of  the  fields  in  Pensacola.  FYI  the  Navy  and  the  Chamber  of  Commerce  as  well  as  the  City  of  Pensacola  tried  to  keep  all  their  training  facilities  as  well  as  take  in  more  from  other  areas.  On  the   Pensacola  Naval  website  they  admit  they  were  forced  to  deal  with  complaints  about  noise  in  the  Pensacola  area   because  of  the  encroachment  of  subdivisions  closer  to  the  airfields.
One  way  they  dealt  with  this  problem  was  to  move  training  to  smaller  PUBLIC  Municipal  Airport  like  Bay  Minette  and  Evergreen  for  example.  I'm  also  well aware  of  the  the  ignorance  of  those  who  would  say  or  imply  that  i  am  unpatriotic,  they  don't  know  the  meaning  of  the  term.  By  the  way  i  am  a  Navy  Submarine  veteran  of  the  Vietnam  conflict  as  well  as  the  Cuban  missile  crisis. Also, i  was  in  Vietnam  as  a  civilian  Merchant  seaman  during  that  conlict.  I  am  retired  from  the  Dept.  of  Defense  having   worked  at  Brookley  AFB  and  lastly  Ft.  Rucker Army  base.   That  doesn't  stop  me  from  critisizing  the  policies  of  the  Navy  or  the  Federal  Government  when  i  think  they  are  wrong.
Although  with  the  present  administration  that  could  lead  to  dire  consequences.

Since  your  website  name  is  LA DUDE  your  probably  too  young  to  remember  any  of  the  facts  of  my  last  e-mail.

oldmariner,

You make some great arguments if only they were accurate in their foundational facts.  A fact is only as strong as the information that it is based on.  For instance; as for 200 flights a day you mentioned are flying over your house - I'd dare say that is a gross embellishment.  I currently train at the Skywarrior facility in which you declared has violated your constitutional rights.  Skywarrior (which trains both civilian and military pilots) only has 14 Cessna 172's (a glorified lawntractor with wings and a cockpit), so there is no way that the amount of air traffic coming from Bay Minette (Skywarrior) is the sole malefactor.  Actually, if you did your homework before buying your house, the house you purchased two years ago in White House Fork finds itself nestled under 3 "Victor" routes (V-198, V-241, and V-454) which have been established by the FAA as Class E Airspace low altitude Federal Airways for normal civil air traffic.  These airways have been established for quite some time, probably dating back to when you first moved to Fairhope.  In addition to the Victor routes, White House Fork also finds itself located in the western edge of A-292, a Military Operations Area which states on the New Orleans North FAA Sectional: "CAUTION High volume of rotary and fixed wing training surface to 17,500' ".  Now, I don't know about you, but I think that this includes ALL military training aircraft, whether they are flying out of Bay Minette, Pensacola Regional, Saufley Field, Whiting Field, or any other FAA approved airstrip in the area.  But you, being a salty, experience and informed patriotic American, would have done your homework first before purchasing a house that sits under a military training area, especially if you loathe overflights by civil and military aircraft.

Going back to the number of flights coming in and out of Bay Minette (1R8), many of these flights have nothing to do with the military.  It just so happens that Bay Minette has the cheapest AV Gas in the area and many penny-pinching, private and corporate pilots enjoy keeping just a little extra cash in their pockets, as I'm sure the rest of America does.  SO...what you claim are military training flyovers are actually many civil private aircraft coming in for fuel, which is their constitutional right as pilots to purchase the gas of their choosing from the vendors of their choosing.  Oh, and doesn't the tax made on the fuel go to reducing the taxes in your county.  Now as a property owner, as I am, if my property tax is kept lower because a business in the area is lining the pockets of the city coffers and I'm not having to, I think that I can put up with the lawnmower sound of a Cessna 172 putting by at 2,500 feet.

Now that you have been informed truthfully and accurately (which all my statements can be looked up on the internet at the FAA's website, the New Orleans North Air Sectional, or by calling the airport), don't you feel like a heel for claiming your constitutional rights have been violated by a plane flying over your house...a house that you purchased without doing the requisite homework.  I WOULD!

P.S. These might just be the reasons why your crying is not being listened to by your political representatives.

Times are a changin--like it or not. Just cause something's been done for 70yrs doesn't make it a good thing today. Thankfully we live in a democracy and when enough newcomers move in to complain-- the Navy will have to move elsewhere. They're doing it over Baldwin cause the folks in more populated Florida ran them out years ago! Just a matter of time here too. Of course Bay Minnete City Councilors just want the cash! Change is good.

We have lived here in Molino, FL for almost two years. We did not notice any navy training planes flying over our house the first year we lived here. About 6 months ago I noticed several navy planes flying over head, so no big deal I thought. A few weeks went by and I noticed them flying more often and closer to the house. This continued for several more months. About the middle of the month (June) I decided to count how many times they were flying over our house. I started on June 19, 2008, and what I counted really shocked me because I counted that day alone over 80 times over our house (it varies each day 28 up to 80). They start about 8:00am and fly until about 9:30pm. This seems a bit excessive. I also noticed they would dive down toward our house most of the time. This makes us feel like targets, and that does not feel very good, because you don’t know whether they are going to pull up in time or not. Now imagine that feeling every five minutes or less 12 to 13 hours a day five days a week. We can’t read any book, or watch tv, or do research on the computer, not even take a nap, and also it is very hard to sit down and have any meal without hearing planes flying overhead. The only way to escape is to leave our home for each day. I had to leave my job to stay home to help take care of my roommate. She has a severe disability, and she cannot walk or stand very long anymore. She also has lots of animal that she needs help to take care of. We live on fix income, so we just cannot leave our house everyday to escape the navy planes. I also noticed that they still do this in storms (rain, lighting). I don’t like the idea that a training pilot is taking that much of a chance with other peoples (our) safety! When we moved here we were never told that we are in a direct path of military training grounds. We would have never bought or even consider this property at all! I have contacted the Navy about this and they said that they have been doing this for years with no problems, but I would have noticed this going on when I first bought my home. They also said that the pilots fly at 2500 feet then they dive down to 1700 feet, but at 1700 feet the noise from the plane should not interrupt conversation between two people on the ground, which it does. I am not getting anywhere with the Navy. I believe they are flying much lower than that, but who is watching them? There is plenty of vacant land around here and farmer’s fields that no one lives on and that is what they need to be flying over. One other thing, why is navy training pilots from another base in another county flying over Escambia citizen’s homes without their prior knowledge or even their approval? We have contacted our county commissioner, but he said he had no jurisdiction in the military matters. All he could do was forward my message to the commander of Whiting Field in hope this might help, but I think this made it worse. We have also contacted our Congressman, but no reply. We also tried to get any legal help, but with results. We don’t know what else to If anyone has an idea please let us know

"Today  its  my  constitutional  rights  being  violated;  tomorrow  it  may  well  be  yours."

Oldmariner, exactly which constitutional right are you reffering to?  And are you upset because you bought a home in an area that has historically been in an area of aviation training, or are you upset because, heaven forbid, the Bay Minette Municipal Airport is being utilized as just that, an airport. And one last thing to point out; Student Naval Aviators are statistically much safer pilots, even as students, than your general aviation pilots, partly because they don't let too many dumb shmucks into the program to begin with. Who would you rather be flying over your house? The college graduates that take their flight training extremely seriously and are dedicating their lives to aviation, or the random civlian that the general aviation school let's in?

And please don't be offended, but it seems both you and wildrogue failed to do your homework prior to purchasing your homes, and now you're trying to avoid taking responsibility for your choices. I'm not saying change isn't good, but it's presumptious to move into an area and then start demanding people (or organizations) change their ways to accomodate you.

One other thing to point out;

The NASC program being operated in part by Bay Minette is known as IFS (Introductory Flight Screeening) which is the exact same program taught to civlians student pilots, which is a relatively new program. However, since IFS is operated by civilian schools, they use civilian planes, and there is no way for you to distinguish the student naval aviators from civilian pilots. You may see the random T-34's every so often, but more likely than not you are really experiencing civilian owned and operated Cessna's.