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Aviation History
1976
1976 - 0006.PDF
6 AIR TRANSPORT which consent is sought, exposure to the 90EPNdB noise level will not occur every day at many points within the total contours indicated. In any case, the duration of the exposure will be two minutes or less. C Failure to note that, as a matter of fact, aircraft are not normally held at 7,000ft for long periods after take-off, though all but one of the footprints on the contour map were computed on that assumption. D A confusion between two commonly used but different noise measurements, dBA and EPNdB. Thus the noise level of 90EPNdB was widely reported in the press as having been compared by the EPA spokesman to that of a busy downtown street. This apparently resulted from his misreading of a statement in the Environmental Impact Statement (Chapter VI-46), which lists typical noises not in EPNdB but in dBA. Ninety EPNdB is in fact approximately equivalent to 77dBA, a noise level produced by a range of household appliances. "We would naturally have preferred that our technical Air France considers alternative AIR FRANCE is considering alternative destinations for > Concorde in the United States. This has emerged from recent statements by Air France's general manager, M Gilbert Perol. In an interview with Flight, Air France Concorde operations director M Jean-Claude Martin con firmed that alternative destinations would be commer cially attractive and operationally feasible. If the aircraft is banned from New York and Washington by the US Department of Transportation, said Perol, Air France might operate the aircraft to Miami or Boston. New Environmental Impact Statements would probably be called for, but Perol points out that these destinations are on the US seaboard, alleviating noise problems. Perol did not exclude Montreal, but stressed that this would involve a long subsonic flight over Canada. He commented: "I'm ready to bet that we will get landing rights for Concorde in Washington, but a big question-mark hangs over New York. In any case we would have to start ser vices into New York later than April 1, the date we were planning to start." Commenting on the practicability of alternative US destinations, Martin adds: "Concorde flights will be used by many travellers who live outside New York and for whom departures or arrivals at other city airports would be more convenient. Even for people whose destination is New York, there could still be a considerable time gain over subsonic travel if New York were closed to us. For instance," claims Martin, "Paris-Montreal-New York could be 3J2hr by Concorde, with a good subsonic connection for the Montreal-New York leg. It would not be 5!2hr." It is wrong, Martin points out, to assume that Concorde passengers would all be leaving from and travelling to major cities. "Basing our analysis on the 2,000 bookings we have already taken, more people will begin their journey outside Paris than from Paris. There are also as many people who will begin the journey from other coun tries as from France. So if another airport is available for Concorde in the US it could be a workable alternative, provided this airport is well served by connecting flights." Martin is unwilling to pass a general judgement on the EIS, as Air France did not contribute any data. He does consider it an advance on the draft, and feels that its findings on ground pollution and noise-abatement pro cedures have made a net contribution to the Concorde cause in the US. Formerly with the French Atomic Energy Commission, Martin is less impressed with the EIS conclusions on ozone FLIGHT International, w[e 3 January 1976 staffs had been given the opportunity to discuss these and other matters with you before publication. However, in view of the widespread publicity resulting, I think I should send a copy of this letter to Mr William Coleman, Secre tary of Transportation, and also make it available to the press." Mr Binning's assertion that Concorde is not going to make so much more noise in an already noisy area like Kennedy will nevertheless win the SST few new friends. The local community has expressed its determination not to tolerate further noise and will fight any decision favour able to Concorde. Defending itself against these attacks, the EPA said ^ that its equation of a 90EPNdB single-event noise level to the noise of a busy city street was "a reasonable com parison." The EIS, however, rated "heavy city traffic" at , 92dBA; the EPA's busy city level was 77dBA, a substantial difference which highlights the dangers of translating •* measurements of noise energy into subjective terms. In any case the comparison of a single-event measurement with a continuous noise is virtually meaningless in terms » of total nuisance caused. Technicalities apart, the EPA's publication of a simplified edition of the EIS (together * with the EPA's own opinion on the matter) seems ill-timed \ if not mischievous. gateways i depletion and skin cancer. "Air France," he comments, "is not the National Academy of Science. We do not have astronomy laboratories or satellites for observing the stratosphere." But his personal view on the skin cancer risk is that "conventional reasoning has been applied to a threshold phenomenon and this method is scientifically wrong. The argument about ozone depletion can be com pared to having an X-ray. If you have 300 X-rays in the course of your life you will not suffer. If you have them all in a single afternoon you will die. "The EIS says there might—with the emphasis on 'might'—be more cases of skin cancer if a big Concorde fleet were operating. But you must remember that our planet is the residue of a radioactive explosion. Without radiation we would not exist." Bookings for the first three months of the Paris-Rio service already showed a 50 per cent average load factor with a minimum of 35 per cent. Comments Martin: "We thought the traffic would start with a wave of jet-setters and Concorde fans and that we would get the businessmen later. But we have got our real Concorde business traveller from the start. This is a good augury as it indicates that the customers are here to stay." Extra aircraft for the South Atlantic? If North Atlantic services are delayed an extra Concorde might be put on the South Atlantic route. This would be conditional on the extension of the route to Buenos Aires and Santiago. Other Concorde destinations under study include Tokyo, Caracas, Mexico and points in Africa. "Tokyo could handle ten supersonic flights a week, shared between ourselves, a joint operation with Japan Air Lines and Aeroflot," says Martin. "This is as big as the North Atlantic could be for us. No subsonic aircraft flies to Tokyo non-stop. Concorde will show a pure time gain all the way. We have agreed with the Russians on the principle of a Siberian stop for Concorde. The outstanding problems are the route, super sonic lanes and the lanes into and out of Soviet territory." Martin said that he was surprised by protests in Britain over the level of French Concorde pilots' pay—£42,000 a year for a senior captain. "We invented nothing new for our pilots. Concorde pilots will fly fewer hours to begin with than 747 pilots, but it was not fair to halve their pay for flying less. So we have set a basic flat rate which varies according to service and flying experience. Concorde pilots could eventually be flying as much as 747 crews. We told
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