Noise among BRAC issues
NAVARRE — To reduce impact of Joint Strike Fighter noise on surrounding communities, Eglin Air Force Base officials hope to use three airfields for training.
To ensure the Army 7th Special Forces Group (Airborne) can train discreetly, parts of Eglin’s reservation in east Okaloosa County and west Walton County will have to be closed periodically to outdoor recreation.
Those were the essential points of Eglin’s Base Realignment and Closure environmental impact statement public input meeting in Navarre on Tuesday evening.
A few dozen people attended, but only two offered comments. No one criticized Eglin’s proposed plan for implementing the 2005 BRAC law, which is bringing the Joint Striker Fighter Integrated Training Center and Army Green Berets to the Emerald Coast.
“The areas affected by noise will grow,” said Air Force Col. George Ross, who runs Eglin’s F-35 Sire Activation Task Force.
Warplane sorties at Eglin will more than double when the training center is fully operational by 2015.
Because that means higher levels of noise — single-engine F-35s are louder than the twin-engine F-15s, for example — the air base wants to spread Joint Strike Fighter flight training among Eglin’s main base, Duke Field south of Crestview and Outlying Field Choctaw north of Navarre.
The 7th Special Forces Group would like to see its headquarters established between Camp James E. Rudder and Duke for several reasons, including access to runways that would permit soldiers “rapid and secluded deployments,” said Army Col. Greg Koenig.
The Special Forces soldiers also would need space for helicopter and airplane training, ground maneuvers and small arms and heavy weapons firing.
Eglin will host another public hearing on the implementing BRAC tonight in Niceville.
A draft BRAC environmental analysis is expected in May.