Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1956-07-20

mental zone in the first place.
And our conclusion, after that
thorough study, was that none
of the "a could be subStanti-
ated. Further, it was quite pos
sible that the very pilots re-
porting the near-miss in each
case could very well have been
the pilots responsible for the
incidents. Also, the other pilot
involved in each case also could
have been conducting his
flight both legally and prop
erly. Upshot of all this was
that we decided to. merely
record what we found, and
let it 60 at that. The press
treatment Of those facts, how
ever, gave an entirely different
impreSsion-and they came
in quite handy in pushing for
the Burke airport. The fact
that not one of the "a could
be proved concluSively as
showing up a deficiency in our
present-day system apparently
is Of little concern to the press.
The extensive quotes from
those airline pilots. in your
July is article, would be anus
ing If they were not intended
as a serious threat to the use
Of the air space by others who
must also fly.
The crisis over the horribly
damned radio frequencies at
Washington National is at best
a half-truth. OF course, there's
congestion, just as there is on
your telephone when you get
a busy signal. Your article
refers several times to satura-
ton on these frequencies. This
presumably means that the
system breaks down for any
where from 3 minutes to 4
hours at a time. This is high
ly misleading and untrue.
There are times when more
than one pilot wants to talk to
the tower at the same time.
That's not saturation; it's nor
NAL everyday routine-every-
where in the entire country.
No matter what real estate
statesmen out at Burke tell you,
Washington National is only
the ninth busiest airport in the
country. It's traffic is surpassed
by the airports at Chicago,
Miami, New York (La Guar
dia), Los Angeles, Atlanta,
Denver, Charleston, S. c., and
Cleveland. Even Teterboro,
N. j., comes within a hair
1.9 per cent? of equalling
Washington's traffic-and
Teterboro handles no airline
traffic at all; theirs is all gen.
eral aviation.
And what if the airports are
busy? It's not even remotely
the kind Of traffic volume we
have on our hi g h ways-al-
though the very health and
continued growth of civil
aviation can come only from
an ever-increasing volume Of
traffic. not a reduction such as
is advocated by the airline
pilots.
Today, nearly all the major
airlines are in the black and
off the public dole-for the
simple reason that they're
doing more flying today than
ever before. And the very sys-
tenn that these distorted crit
icisms are being aimed at to-
day is the same system that
has made 1t all possible in the
first place.
Max Karant,
Vice President, Aircraft
Owners and Pilots
Association.
Editors note: The source
of The Stars information is
official records of the Air Co
ordinating Committee - Of
which Mr.. Karant is a member.
The document used in the
report of 24-reported, but UNI
confirmed near-miss collisions.
pointed out that the commit
tees Navigational Panel
agreed unanimously that in
lieu Of a press release. the APP
proved paper would be
made available to members Of
the press who wished to re-
view IT," The Star correctly
reported its findings and also
quoted Mr.. Karant as saying
there was no way to confirm"
any or all of the reported
"near-misses." In its COM
ment on the radio saturation,
the same report says brief,
but numerous periods Of
frequency and controller ca
pacity saturation generally
exist at all times" Mr.. Ka-
rant apparently has not re-
ceived a current Civil Aero
nautics Administration report
showing that Washington Ma
tional Airport is ranked third
in the world in passengers
handled: fourth in the world
in the number Of aircraft
operations)