Since I love to do research, and have all this time on my hands waiting for the FAA to finally correct this airport access process, I thought I would share with you all an email I just sent to the mayor of Laconia and Gilford Selectmen.
It pretty much sums up the irony in this process, that whether it's the LAA or the town elected officials, it seems that those with the least amount of practical knowledge are in the greatest position to affect the outcome of this decision.
Does that bother you? It should.
Anyways, here is the letter I sent:
Quote:
Good afternoon Mr. Mayor (Laconia) and Selectmen (Gilford),
I am writing you today to keep you in the loop on a couple of items as they pertain to Skydive Laconia. I have cc'd the reporter from the Citizen as Selectman Hayes was quoted by the paper in a prior Citizen article when he ambiguously stated that there "may be some" possibility of private jet insurance requirements precluding these jets from patronizing the Laconia Municipal Airport if a skydiving operation were allowed to operate on the airfield to include landing our parachutes on the airfield.
The item of interest that I would like to address with you today pertains to NASCAR. Of the handful of people that object to our desire to land parachutes on the airfield, the foundation for their argument centers around private jets, that the addition of skydiving to the airport will drive off the private jets.
I have talked to many private jet pilots since this process began, and have yet to encounter any that have any objection to flying into or out of an airport such as Laconia if there is a parachute operation present. That is to say, the only private jet pilots to publicly speak against us are an employee and the owner of Sky Bright Aviation, a company based on the airfield itself. It would not be unreasonable to assume that any opinion coming from a business already on the airfield may be somewhat clouded in bias, as the easiest way to avoid having to share the airfield with another business is to prevent that business access to the airfield.
My point is simply this: I recently contacted the chief pilot of an air charter service that ferries quite a few of those NASCAR drivers into New Hampshire for the races at Loudon. He and the pilots he manages have flown into and out of Laconia for years in private jets. These are the very same private jets Selectman Hayes was so fearful of losing with our presence on the airfield.
The highlights of the conversation went as follows:
- After having flown into and out of Laconia repeatedly, making them intimately knowledgable about the airport and it's approach, none of them would have any issue whatsoever with arriving or departing Laconia with a parachute operation on the airport that included landing parachutes on the airport.
- They do not preclude landing at airports with skydiving operations when they do their flight planning.
- When they fly the largest of their private jets, they don't even come to Laconia any more, they fly them into Manchester.
- They have never in their entire professional history, ever heard of an insurance policy that would preclude a jet from landing at an airport with an on-field parachute operation.
I offer you this information in advance, as the FAA on a federal level is currently in the process of correcting the two erroneous reports issued by the local office of the FAA (the ADO), and when that is complete, we fully expect the FAA to instruct the Laconia Airport Authority to either allow us to operate or to forfeiture their federal funding grant assurances for discriminating against an aeronautical activity such as ours. I have requested all of the documents associated with this reporting process through the FOIA and when I receive it, I plan to publish it all locally and nationally. In so much as the federal government cannot be litigated against, the court of public opinion has no such boundaries and the public can decide for itself whether or not my wife and I were treated fairly during this lengthy process.
I have cc'd Mr. Haas for two reasons on this email:
1) Simply to keep him informed on the current status of our request
and
2) More importantly, in the hopes that when the time comes, he will be willing to ask a very important question of Selectman Hayes: "Where did you get that purposely ambiguous information that some insurance policies may prevent private jets from landing in Laconia if there is a parachute operation on the airfield?" (My bet, should Selectman Hayes be willing to answer the question, is that it came from someone already in business on the airport in Laconia, or possibly from a member of the airport board itself.)
I recognize there are two sides to every story, and I welcome Selectman Hayes' opportunity to share his side of the story by answering that simple question.
I fully understand that despite the fact that anyone "in the know" in the aviation insurance industry acknowledges that such a policy simply doesn't exist, that motivation to save face being what it is, I would not put it past anyone in this process to track down a one-off insurance provider that is willing to write in an exclusion to a policy to protect the person or persons that have fed Selectman Hayes his erroneous information.
(Mr. Haas, assuming the Selectman can even find a singular instance of such a policy, I would be curious to follow up with the policy writer to find out 1) When it was written (I would assume it would be written after this email) and 2) how many other policies were written with the same exclusion (I would expect none).
As I can only assume that since a member of the Gilford Selectmen also sits on the LAA board, that this email will be forwarded to the LAA, who will in turn forward it on to the FBOs, and anyone else on their "Skydive Laconia" email list, I would like to candidly offer anyone that receives this with any questions to feel free to contact me directly.
Best regards,
Tom Noonan
Skydive Laconia
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If any of you would like to follow up directly with your elected officials:
The mayor of Laconia:
[email protected]
or the
Gilford Selectmen:
[email protected]
Please feel free to do so.
Blue skies to all and to all a good flight,
Tom