Now Hear This: El Toro Jet Tests OKd

South Orange County residents pleaded in vain Tuesday for a halt to the scheduled jet noise test at the El Toro Marine base: County supervisors approved the demonstration on a 3-2 vote.

More than a dozen speakers at the Board of Supervisors meeting argued that the $1.3-million demonstration, scheduled for June 4 and 5, would give a skewed sense of the airport’s future operations.

But the board’s chairman, Charles V. Smith, part of the majority vote, said the plan for at least 27 flights into and out of El Toro will give Orange County residents a chance to hear what kind of noise is generated by commercial jets flying over and around the base.

Opponents echoed the sentiments of Supervisor Tom Wilson, who proposed the test nearly two years ago but has since repudiated it. He contends the flights won’t provide a meaningful demonstration of airport noise because they won’t show what life would be like with constant sound from a 24-hour operation.

Pilots have misgivings about the safety of the test. The Air Line Pilots Assn. and the Allied Pilots Assn., two unions that represent commercial airline pilots, oppose the county’s proposed northerly and easterly departure routes from El Toro because rising terrain and nearby hills make them unsafe.

Unless planes take off to the west, the route preferred by pilots, the flight test will be “invalid,” commercial pilot Stan Sanders told supervisors.

Supervisor Todd Spitzer, who with Wilson voted against the test, accused county staff of failing to disclose the potential dangers of the test to the insurance carriers that are providing $100 million in coverage. Only two of seven carriers have agreed to hold the county harmless in case of pilot error or negligence, he said.

“If there is a disaster, the taxpayers will be paying any significant claims for years to come,” Spitzer said.

The noisiest portion of the flights will occur over about 18,000 acres of undeveloped land around El Toro, county planners predict. Airport backers argue that foes don’t want the test because it will demonstrate what little noise impact the jets actually will have.

“My question to airport opponents is, ‘What are you afraid of?’ ” Smith said. “ ‘Why don’t you want people to know what it’s like when a [Boeing] 747-400 takes off and lands?’ ”

Ten temporary monitoring stations will be set up along the landing and departure paths to gauge the noise.

Debate over the proposed noise demonstration has grown in recent months. The county had hoped to begin cargo flights at El Toro after the Marines leave July 2, but those plans have been pushed back while the Navy conducts more environmental studies.

That leaves the noise test as the only opportunity for airliners to use the base until next year at the earliest.

South County airport foes said the pro-airport board majority will be spending $1.3 million, which will come from John Wayne Airport revenue, on a “publicity stunt.”

“They’re going to use this as an example [showing] that there’s no problem with the airport, and that’s just not the case,” said Meg Waters, spokeswoman for a seven-city coalition opposed to the airport.

Several speakers Tuesday questioned why the county insists on planes flying to the north, over Loma Ridge, when Marine pilots fly only southerly takeoffs.

“If it were safe, why wouldn’t the Marines have done it?” asked Orange Park Acres resident Bob Bennyhoff. “What do you know that the Marines don’t?”

Irvine Councilman Larry Agran said the Marines stopped using northerly departures in 1968 after a military training jet crashed on Loma Ridge.

“Frankly, your staff proposal disregards the painful memory of the fallen Marines,” Agran said.

Jim Wood, an airport supporter and co-publisher of the Coaster magazine in Newport Beach, said the test may not be scientific but will be “extremely practical” for residents who want to judge the jet noise for themselves.

“There’s a huge silent majority undecided on the issue,” he said.

While speakers lined up for the chance to argue about the noise test, there were no comments about the next item on the board agenda--approving a $1.6-million increase in costs for the county’s airport planning consultant.

The additional expense stems from a decision in 1996 to study two possible airport projects at El Toro, one with a seven-mile rail link to John Wayne Airport. The tandem studies were pushed by former Supervisor William G. Steiner to assure South County residents that John Wayne Airport would remain a commercial airport after El Toro is built.

But supervisors in March dropped the rail link as too expensive. They ordered planning to continue on the final project proposal, which calls for El Toro to handle up to 28.8 million passengers a year by 2020, while use of John Wayne Airport drops.

The payment authorized Tuesday reimburses P&D; Aviation for costs already incurred on the additional work.

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Times staff writer David Reyes contributed to this report.