Editor,
In his June 15 letter, Ted Brown, Energy and Environmental Public Affairs Officer, Fleet Forces Command, Norfolk, Va., asserted that Growlers are quieter than Prowlers.
Not sure what data he was using. Maybe those gentile, southern-boy, Norfolk Growlers speak softer than our Washington Growlers?
Or maybe he was using the Navy’s modeled data, rather than on-site noise data because the Navy has none. A study of 36 sites around the Raleigh–Durham airport found the modeled data consistently underestimated actual on-site noise by about 50 percent to 150 percent.
The Navy itself disagrees with Mr. Brown. That is, their own Naval Air Station Whidbey Island planning document, 2005 AICUZ, Table 4-3, says that at 1,000 feet Growlers on approach to landing are 7 decibels louder than Prowlers and, on takeoff, are 3 dB louder than Prowlers.
But, Mr. Brown, did get one thing right — a 5 dB increase is quite noticable, and 10 dB doubles loudness. So, folks out there under the approach, like at Admirals Cove, Mr. Brown agrees — you are hammered by noise nearly twice that of Prowlers.
Speaking of Admirals Cove, if it was a Navy site, all residents would mandatorily be part of a Hearing Conservation Program for working in a “Hazardous Noise Area,” i.e. any area in which “the eight-hour, time-weighted average noise exceeds 85 dB for more than two days in any month.”
Military working in such areas are automatically put in that program, identified as “at risk,” and required to undergo frequent hearing tests and health monitoring.
Noise experts examined on-site noise levels around the OLF and discovered that folks living there are experiencing way over the Navy’s threshold for designation of a “hazardous noise area.”
For example, in July 2012, there were 1,122 overflights of Admirals Cove, or an average of 80 overflights for each of the 14 flying days that month.
The noise that residents experienced that July exceeded the Navy’s Hearing Conservation Zone threshold by more than sevenfold.
Per Navy proviso, they are well beyond being at risk and should be undergoing routine health monitoring. Yet Mr. Brown counsels civilians not to worry — no health risk here, folks — move along, it’s all in your genetics.
Robert Wilbur
Coupeville
