Plane statistics for Milton, December 1-8, 2015

In the first 8 days of December that consisted of 192 hours, of which 64 hours are nocturnal (10 p.m. – 6 a.m.)

• Milton had arrivals (to the Runways 4R/L) or departures (from R27) over our town for 6 days (75% of the 8 days).
• Milton had arrivals or departures over our town for 72 hours (38% of the 192 hours).
• Milton had arrivals or departures over our town for 18 nocturnal hours (13 hours of arrivals and 5 hours of departures; 28% of the 64 hours).  
• Departures flew over Milton on 3 of the 8 days.
• Arrivals flew over Milton 4 of the 8 days.
• On December 1, low flying arrivals flew over our town for 14 hours.
• On the next day, Dec 2, low flying planes arrived over Milton for 11 hours.
• On December 8, arrivals flew over our town for 23 hours.
• On Dec 7 and 8th, 30 of the 48 hours were filled with low flying arrivals over Milton (63% of the hours in these 2 days).
• Of the 46 hours of arrivals to the 4’s, only 30 hours were at times when the winds were from the N, NE or E (65% of the 46 hours) when the 4’s need to be used for safety reasons.
• The remaining 16 hours when the 4’s were used for arrivals (35% of the time the R4R/L were used), the winds were NW, W, SE or calm.
• During these 8 days, Milton received planes for 16 hours when wind direction and speed would allow other arrival runway choices.  
• Using the PRAS* goals, the FAA failed 5 times out of 8 to adhere to  the goal not to “dwell” over any community for more than 7 hours in a 24 hour period.
• Using the PRAS* goals, the FAA failed 2 times out of 6 to adhere to the goal not to “persist” over any community  for more than 23 hours over a 3 day consecutive period.

*Preferential Runway Advisory System (PRAS). These goals were developed by a PRAS Advisory Committee in 1980-83. The goals were abandoned in 2012 partly because the FAA seldom adhered to them. However, they are currently our best gauge of whether or not there is a fair distribution of Logan airport burden.

Sources:

Mr. Gene Brown of Milton, former Logan CAC representative
Cindy Christiansen of Milton, PhD, Logan CAC representative
Boston Logan Runway Usage Reports: www.massport.com/environment/environmental-reporting/noise-abatement/runway-use

Additional resources:

Who to contact about air traffic issues in Milton.