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HomeMy WebLinkAboutFlying Cloud Airport Advisory Commission - 07/22/2021APPROVED MINUTES FLYING CLOUD AIRPORT ADVISORY COMMISSION TUESDAY, JULY 22, 2021 7:00 P.M. CITY CENTER 8080 MITCHELL RD COMMISSION MEMBERS: Chair: Daniel Dorson Vice Chair: Andy Kleinfehn Commissioners: Keith Tschohl Bob Barker Chilkunda Narendranath Michael Lawrence (Business Representative) Blaine Peterson (Airport Manager) STUDENT MEMBERS: Evelyn Hemler, Abshir Noor, Pranav Kartha, Yash Salunke, Jake Dorson COMMISSION STAFF: Scott Gerber, EP Fire Chief Kristin Harley, Recording Secretary MAC STAFF: Jennifer Lewis I. CALL TO ORDER/ROLL CALL Chair Dorson called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. Loren Jones, chief flight instructor at AV8 Flight School, joined the meeting. Also attending the meeting were resident Kurt Laughton, Laura Herrmann, Kevin Rixman of Life Link, and Paige Rulnick. II. APPROVAL OF AGENDA MOTION: Tschohl moved, seconded by Kleinfehn to approve the agenda. Motion carried 7-0. III. PUBLIC COMMENTS None IV. APPROVAL OF MINUTES FLYING CLOUD AIRPORT ADVISORY COMMISSION July 22, 2021 Page 2 MOTION: Kleinfehn moved, seconded by Tschohl to approve the amended minutes of the April 8, 2021 meeting with small spelling and naming corrections. Motion carried 7- 0. V. OLD BUSINESS a. Recap of May 14th Airport Tour Dorson displayed several images and summarized the tour. Barker thanked MAC for supplying transportation. VI. NEW BUSINESS a. Airport night operations overview Kevin Rixman, flight nurse at Life Link III and private pilot, displayed a PowerPoint and detailed night operations. Life Link was a consortium based helicopter company that was owned by ten hospital systems and based in two states that provided service across those states and other. Life Link was a VFR-only Program, with one IFR-rated aircraft. The company utilized night vision goggles on all night flights. It flew an Augusta 119 and a PC12 turboprop, and would soon have an Augusta 109 twin engine aircraft and a 169 helicopter Life Link had ten bases and 11 airframes. The company supplied effective air medical transport for critical care patients. This included scene flights such as accidents on roadways or in people’s backyard. Included were interfacility flights (hospital to hospital). Patients served were adults, pediatric patients, and neonatal patients. The company had airlift ability of the patient population ranging in weight from 200 grams (the weight of a can of tomato paste) to 400 pounds. b. Lifelink helicopter aircrew perspective The company only flew in VFR conditions and would fly in lower limits of VFR under clouds. Life Link’s company minimums were 1000-foot ceilings and three miles visibility; the lowest altitude for flight was 300 feet from the ground. The company flew low due to ceilings minimums and because some patient conditions require low altitudes. This also avoided class B interference and commercial airspace. Sometimes the airport rerouted the Life Link helicopter. The helicopter often flew over the same areas multiple times due to multiple patients, picking up a medical team beforehand, et cetera. When returning to base the company tries to fly at a higher altitude. Tschohl noted there was no way around the low altitude also because the helicopters were not pressurized. He asked for and received confirmation that all fixed-wing (PC12) flights were at higher altitudes, being pressurized. FLYING CLOUD AIRPORT ADVISORY COMMISSION July 22, 2021 Page 3 Dorson thanked Rixman for his presentation and asked what percentage of these flights were night operations. Rixman replied there was a high percentage of night operations in summer, such as drunk drivers and drivers falling asleep at the wheel. There could be four flights in a 12-hour night shift. Chilkunda Narendranath asked if winter could affect the flights. Rixman replied it could; the company could fly down to minus 25 degrees Celsius and could not fly during icing conditions. However, the PC12 had as anti-icing and deicing capabilities. Kleinfehn asked who made the calls to Life Link, and Rixman replied they were often scene requests from fire, EMS or police. The company has an autolaunch program. At other times Life Link literally orbited overhead and decided if service was needed. For interfacility flights a sending and receiving doctor made the call. If a referring doctor determined one hospital didn’t have resources that could also result in a call. Laura Herrmann identified herself as a former Hennepin County nurse and stated there were also delivery flights; for example delivering more platelets faster by air than by ground. Peterson asked for and received confirmation Life Link pilots used night vision goggles at night at all times. There were also at least four dispatchers at all times plus managerial staff monitoring the flight vector system which sent notifications upon takeoff, landing, landing in an unforeseen area, et cetera. There were two communication specialists and two control specialists. Gerber stated during his work as a paramedic in the 1980s and 90s there were only three hospitals in the system: North Memorial, Life Link and Mayo Clinic. Today there was a much more robust system, with more shifts available, more volumes and other changes reflecting changes in medical profession. Eden Prairie used to have systems that ran out of Flying Cloud. Rixman stated those were transferred to the Anoka area. VII. STANDING DISCUSSION ITEMS A. NOISE REPORT - MAC Jennifer Lewis, Community Relations Coordinator for MAC, gave the quarterly noise report for the second quarter of 2021. For the benefit of the guests she gave an overview of the Macnoise.com flight tracker. MAC Reliever Interactive Reports were also available and the new Meet the Fleet events were on the website. She stated there were 5,841 complaints about Flying Cloud from 57 households during April, May and June of 2021. There were 729 nighttime complaints from 34 households. Flying Cloud Airport needed to be available for use 24/7 and FLYING CLOUD AIRPORT ADVISORY COMMISSION July 22, 2021 Page 4 flights could not be curtailed. There were fewer complaints in 2020 from fewer households in the second quarter. The top two households for complaints filed 57 complaints and were similar to households who filed complaints in the past. This was an increase in night operations compared to the second quarter in 2020. Nighttime operations made up only four percent of flight at Flying Cloud. There had been an increase in operations but most were not at night. Nighttime flights were seen from these aircraft: PC12 Pipers and Beech 200 Lewis offered to provide more information later. Dorson asked if there was a trend in the number of households complaining. Lewis replied in 2019 there were 11,086 complaints from 59 households, in 2020 there 51 households complaining, and in 2021 there were 57. Overall, complaints were down. Dorson noted this was a decrease of 12 percent. Laughton said he came to find out if nighttime operations were voluntary and he had become tired of complaining. He did not mind daytime operations. He lived south of the airport and his understanding of pilot instructions was they were supposed to curve south and did not. He asked the commission to find a way to diminish the sound. Dorson agreed the nighttime ops were the focus for this meeting. Tschohl stated this commission had talked about this extensively. The issue came down to the ability of an aircraft to make a turn, constrained by the radius of turn, according to instructions from Minneapolis Radar Control. Westbound traffic would not turn, because that would involve climbing to 400 feet before starting the turn and the typical climeout speeds required a turning radii of a mile and a half or two miles. Unfortunately if they followed the instructions they will end up over Laughton’s neighborhood. Barker asked if the aircraft making noise at night were jets or piston, and Laughton replied they were both. Barker offered to have the commission look at the data. Laughton stated the offending aircraft were louder jets and some prop planes. Landings were not as noisy. Dorson noted the prevailing winds were to the west so takeoffs probably happened over Laughton’s residence. Tschohl asked what time Laughton noticed the noise and he replied it was a broad mix of morning and night, usually after midnight. Tschohl noted this time was not a normally scheduled flight, and wondered if these could be medically chartered flights, such as with organ transplants. Dorson noted the Flying Cloud tower FLYING CLOUD AIRPORT ADVISORY COMMISSION July 22, 2021 Page 5 closed at night, and very little moved in those hours. Lewis stated any operation that occurred during nighttime hours that generated a complaint that was not exempt resulted in the MAC sending a letter to make pilots and crews more aware of the community. The Flying Cloud Airport tenants have been very respectful and engaged. Dorson stated there was value in filing noise complaints. Lewis stated there were noise abatement and engagement efforts as a result of those complaints. Herrmann stated there were noise abatements webinars available to pilots twice annually, and Lewis replied she would be interested in those dates and times. Paige Rulnick stated the letter received mentioned a reference number but no tail number. Lewis stated she could get the tail number information. Laughton asked if there were training at 3:00 a.m. Barker replied trainings would not go that late but there were some mandated trainings after dark. Tschohl added no trainings for a commercial certificate would be happening between 10:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. Gerber thanked Laughton for reaching out and coming to the meeting. B. ORDINANCE 97 MONITORING – MAC Peterson stated five aircraft in the second quarter of 2021 were in violation and letters would be going out. One was a two-time violator. Dorson noted there were no violations in the last quarter. Kleinfehn noted the heavier the aircraft the more noise from the engines. Barker stated there was less so now and the weight of the aircraft upon takeoff was being enforced as a proxy for noise. C. AIRPORT INCIDENTS AND OPERATIONAL UPDATES – MAC Peterson reported there were eight emergency responses from May to the present. All landed without incident, and the most recent was an engine failure on Tuesday. There were eight pilots deviations, three runway excursions, and one runway incursion. A lot were due to the failure to take a moment to assess the situation and follow the tower instructions. One was the tower not catching the feedback and the pilot received instructions wrong. This presented a training opportunity. The tower had four new controllers out of 12. Barker asked the number of saves, and Peterson replied there had been five. There was one bird strike in June which caused major damage, another last night, and one today, but with no damage and no birds found on runway in the last two cases. Peterson had called the USDA officer to develop a plan. There had been 36,432 operations in the second quarter of 2021, an increase of 7 percent from the same time last year (32,094 operations). There was an 18 percent overall increase in overall operations in 2020 from 2019. Dorson asked if this was FLYING CLOUD AIRPORT ADVISORY COMMISSION July 22, 2021 Page 6 flight training, and Peterson replied it was due both to training and also charter services. Barker asked for the difference between tower counts and MAC noms and if they were different at the same rate. Lewis stated as of July 1, 2021 MAC was changing the MAC noms process and counting touch-and-go events separately. Therefore, every landing and every takeoff could be counted as an operation. Barker stated this was good news, as it bothered him when there were two sets of count from the tower and from MAC, and this would allow more year-by-year comparisons. However, commission members would have to be conscious of this new baseline. Peterson stated second quarter tower counts was 36,432. Lewis stated now MAC would be tracking above tower counts with nighttime operations included. Baker noted the data would better reflect reality now. D. PRIMARY RELIEVER AIRPORTS VISIONARY STUDY - MAC Peterson reported a new planner was hired in June, Lydia Warner, would attend the October meeting and present on the status and next steps of the study. VII. UPCOMING EVENTS AND TOPICS FOR FUTURE FCAAC MEETINGS a. Air Expo on July 24 and 25, including the landing of a C-130, four A10s. At 10:00 a.m. the national anthem would open the event. There were F-16s coming from Duluth, rides in a B-17 and helicopter, and two P-51 mustangs and a spitfire would be displayed. The Goodyear Blimp would arrive Friday for the golf tournament, with rides beginning at 10:00 a.m., and would depart at 2:30 p.m. with Taps being played. b. October meeting: The commission discussed possible vocational opportunities offered by the airport as a potential topic. Dorson suggested inviting the Eden Prairie School Superintendent in here. Peterson stated he had had a conversation with him and Superintendent Swanson would love to present on how the curriculum is being changed to entice students with a passion for aviation. Dorson also suggested inviting Steve Bruss. Discussion followed on the new student members. Gerber stated they would come in August for an orientation with the City Manager and the City Attorney. Lawrence stated it was National Business Aviation Convention in Las Vegas during the commission’s October meeting. Dorson stated the next meeting would be held on January 13, 2022, and Lawrence stated he would be present for that meeting. FLYING CLOUD AIRPORT ADVISORY COMMISSION July 22, 2021 Page 7 Kleinfehn offered to research the military’s helicopter use at Flying Cloud and would reach out to the unit commander. VII. ADJOURNMENT The next FCAAC meeting will be held on Thursday, October 14, 2021 at 7:00 p.m. in the Heritage Rooms. MOTION: Barker moved, seconded by Tschohl to adjourn. Motion carried 7-0. The meeting was adjourned at 8:09 p.m.