[TowerTalk] FAA & Private Airstrips

[Mike Ashby]

Bill; 
I just finished making application to the FAA and after about 60 days received back a "Notice of presumed HAZARD to air navigation" letter from them.  This has since has been resolved and I now have received the go ahead to install a tower.  QTH is 5572 feet south of a very small municipal airport.  Tower location falls in the first ring around the airport marked by the FAA as "Horizontal Surface elevation: 150 feet".  10 feet further east on my 10 acre property begins the outer ring around the airport marked "Conical Surface 20:1" 
One would think that in the 1st ring the tower could be 150 ft in height and in the 2nd ring it could be 278 ft in height, (5572/20)...........I did.  Started application by taking some quick elevation measurements with GPS unit and made application for a 120 foot tower, it was rejected.  After long discussion with FAA, took a trip over to the airport to talk with the manager.  I wanted to find the airport elevation marker for the airstrip.  They didn't know where it was.  The sign at the entrance to the property posted the elevation as 5680 ft.  The FAA shows it as 5637 ft.  I asked a pilot of a small commercial jet, that was sitting of the airstrip what his altimeter was reading and he said 5605 ft.  (That would be 32 ft below the official FAA surface of the runway elevation).  Went into town and found an official USGS survey marker and calibrated my GPS.  Went back to QTH and remeasured, nothing was looking good for me.  Called FAA, discussed my measurements.........decided I would use same thing that they were checking with...................GOOGLE EARTH!   Plugged in all of the measurements, adjusted tower height down to 110ft, (could have gone as high as 113 ft but didn't want to press my luck), sent changes back to FAA and received approval next day.  So much for the "150 ft zone" and the "20:1" zone.............never did get a good explanation as to why not, just happy to get what I got.

Mike 









> From: himself at edhaggerty.com
> Date: Fri, 30 Dec 2011 10:50:10 -0500
> To: bill.aa7xt at gmail.com
> CC: towertalk at contesting.com
> Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] FAA & Private Airstrips
> 
> Bill
> 
> Unless you have a deep hatred for airplanes and people who fly them......please contact the owner/operator of the airstrip and inform them of the position and hight of your tower.
> 
> 73  Ed  KB3TOX
> 
> On 29 Dec, 2011, at 7:56 PM, William Hein wrote:
> 
> > My family and I recently moved to a wonderful house in beautiful Glade Park CO (on the other side of Colorado National Monument from Grand Junction.  The house itself is an ultra-energy efficient Earthship (Google "Glade Park Earthship" for more info).  We have 35 rural acres of land around our house in a low population density rural area.  All in all it's going to be a great place for ham radio.
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > The FAA Website TOWAIR indicated that "Structure does not require registration"after I plugged in my coordinates along with elevation (6840-ft ASL approx.). There are no airports within 8 kilometers (5 miles) of the coordinates you provided."  TOWAIR went on to caution "TOWAIR's findings are not definitive or binding".  Since "Pinyon Airport" (a rather pretentious designation for a grass airstrip with a windsock) is 5.5 km away I am guess it is either not registered with the FAA or somehow doesn't count as a real airport.
> > 
> > I have a 142-foot Big Bertha tower which I previously had installed in Vermont which I intend to reinstall here along with at least one other 100-ft + tower and a few smaller structures.  For many reasons I'd hate to see a airplane run into Bertha.
> > 
> > So what should I do now?  Contact the FAA for an opinion?  Find out who owns the airstrip and give them a verbal or written heads up on my tower plans and also request they avoid flying low over my house?  Something else?
> > 
> > 73
> > Bill
> > 
> > -----
> > William Hein, AA7XT
> > (ex-AA4XT, NT1Y, AA6TT, KC6EDP)
> > 
> > 
> > 
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> > 
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