Building Near Airport Called Pilot Hazard

A six-story building near Lindbergh Field is an “accident waiting to happen” because 747s and other jumbo jets have little or no room to clear the structure’s top floor while descending into Lindbergh Field, according to the national organization representing commercial airline pilots.

A spokeswoman for the Federal Aviation Administration said Tuesday that the agency is preparing a response to charges by the Air Line Pilots Assn. that the Laurel Travel Center, 1025 W. Laurel St., should be declared an air safety hazard.

Landing Gear Wouldn’t Clear

In a seven-page letter dated Jan. 6, the pilots’ association warned that the landing gear of a 747 wouldn’t clear the structure if the plane were descending into Lindbergh at a minimally approved angle. At that same angle, the letter says, an L-1011 would clear the garage by only 1.8 feet and a DC-10 by 3.8 feet.

“It is unreasonable, and certainly not safe, to expect a pilot to not only monitor his position on the steep and narrow (approach) path, but to study the ever-changing perspective of the runway so he can get his aircraft stabilized well before the runway threshold and, at the same time, assure that the aircraft wheels do not collide with the garage,” wrote John O’Brien, director of the association’s Engineering and Air Safety Department.

The way aircraft are forced to make steep landings at Lindbergh, combined with the height of the building, is “a set-up for an accident waiting to happen,” wrote O’Brien. “That it has not happened yet is not a reason for inaction.”

O’Brien also complained that his group was not asked for input when the building--five stories of parking garage over one floor of office space--was approved by the FAA in 1984. The building opened for business in May, 1986.

Karen McDonald, an FAA air traffic technical specialist, said Monday that the agency’s response to the letter should be ready in several weeks. The FAA has taken more than four months to respond because of limited “time and manpower,” she said.

McDonald said the pilots weren’t asked to comment on the proposed building because the FAA deemed that it would be safe at six stories.

No Hazard Determined

“We did the study, we used our criteria, and we did an aeronautical study and determined that . . . this would not be a hazard to air navigation,” she said.

Sandy Kahn, president of Kent Holdings, the partnership that owns the building, said the first time he heard about the pilots’ complaints was several weeks ago, when an FAA employee asked to stand on the roof of the parking garage.

“We pursued approval by the FAA, and we did it in good faith,” Kahn said. “If you build a building, you assume that whoever blessed those plans knew what they were doing.

“Now, at this late date, it’s extremely frustrating to be caught in a controversy between an important public interest group, like the Air Line Pilots Assn., and the FAA.”

Currently, no 747s fly into Lindbergh, but British Airways will begin sending in two a week starting June 1, said Jon Mathiasen, assistant airport director. Flying Tigers Inc., a cargo transporter, uses 747s occasionally for heavy loads. Several 747 charters landed during Super Bowl week.

Two L-1011s and six DC-10s land daily at Lindbergh, Mathiasen added.

O’Brien said in his letter that there have been many pilot complaints about the building. Of particular concern is the structure’s northwestern corner, which measures 93.9 feet above sea level.

Because the building sits only 710 feet away from the end of runway, it could be a sudden obstruction for the unsuspecting pilot who ducks below clouds and fog while landing, said Dick Russell, a United Airlines pilot and area safety coordinator for the pilots’ chapter in the Los Angeles region.

“We had enough natural hazards, the hills and such there, without adding a man-made one,” Russell said. “If you hit that building, of course, you don’t know what angle you might hit it as to what the ramifications might be.

“It might tear the landing gear off the airplane, or tear the belly out of it, and the subsequent landing could cause a fire.”

Russell said pilots landing at Lindbergh are guided by a navigation system called the Visual Approach Slope Indicator, or VASI. The system is a series of lights on the runway that guide the pilot by color.

If the pilot is approaching at an angle that is too steep, white lights will be seen on the runway. If the pilot is coming in too low, red lights will appear. With an approach at the proper angle, there will be an even number of red and white lights on the runway.

At most airports, the angle of approach is 3 degrees. But the terrain around Lindbergh requires a steeper descent of roughly 4.5 degrees, aviation officials said.

Calculations based on that angle, combined with other conditions, show that 747s wouldn’t make it past the building without a crash, O’Brien wrote.

“The FAA has long known that high-angle approaches require increased obstacle clearance,” O’Brien wrote. “This is because the trajectory of an aircraft on a high-angle approach is more towards the obstacle than over it and causes increased path-following errors.”

Such a margin of error may be strained even more if a pilot decides to use the full length of the runway for the landing. Normally, pilots are supposed to touch down about 1,800 feet from the start of the runway.

Full Runway Needed at Times

But sometimes they may want to use the full length of the 9,400-foot strip if they are carrying a heavier than normal load or need extra pavement to stop the aircraft, Russell said, adding that this circumstance would cause them to come even closer to the building.

The pilots’ group asked for another study of the building and for the FAA to declare it a hazard. The group asked that the landing navigation system be adjusted to take the building into account, or that the structure be lowered to allow for at least 20 feet between the building and the landing gear of jumbo jets.

Building owner Kahn said the travel center is a parking garage for people using the airport. “A good 10 to 15% of our customers at any given time are the airline pilots, the crews, the flight attendants,” he said. “They would not be parking there if they were concerned.

“Especially the pilots,” he said. “They all seem to drive BMWs.”