By RICK STEELHAMMER
Charleston Gazette-Mail
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — After meeting recently in Washington, D.C., with Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Federal Aviation Administration officials, a delegation from Charleston’s Yeager Airport returned home feeling optimistic the FAA would help pay for replacing the airport’s collapsed safety overrun area.
That, in turn, would make it possible for replacement work to begin before a series of lawsuits and insurance claims over the March 2015 landslide are settled and the airport is reimbursed.
“We didn’t come away from the meeting with anything in writing, but we were led to believe that the FAA would help us rebuild,” Nick Keller, the airport’s assistant director, told members of Yeager’s governing board on Wednesday.
Keller said FAA officials told those attending the Washington meeting that they wanted to see the safety zone replaced and operational as soon as possible.
“After the master plan is done and the best alternative is identified, it would become a project eligible for FAA support,” Keller said. That’s when Yeager officials would learn to what degree the federal agency would financially support the airport in getting the safety overrun area operational again.
Only about 5,000 of the more than 550,000 cubic yards of debris that slid off the safety overrun area remain to be removed by contractors working for Yeager, according to Keller. Charleston Sanitary Board workers have repaired and put back in service a sewer line that was crushed during the March 2015 landslide, and Keystone Drive is expected to be able to reopen by the end of the month, although probably with a temporary packed gravel surface since asphalt plants are expected to be closed for the season by then.
Earlier in the meeting, the airport’s governing board voted to name the Cincinnati firm of Landrum & Brown as the engineer of record in designing the master plan update.
In other developments, a new U.S. Customs agent has begun work at the Charleston airport, filling a vacancy that had been open since the retirement of former agent Norm Justice in December 2014. Last Friday, the new agent cleared a private Canadian aircraft with six passengers aboard at Yeager’s Executive Air Terminal, marking the first time an international flight has been able to fly directly to Charleston without landing first to clear customs at another U.S. port of entry.
When the new Customs agent first arrived at the Charleston airport, he told Yeager officials he was not authorized to clear passengers and cargo there, since the facility lacks an agency-approved building equipped with a storage room, holding cell, computer room and other facilities.
With help from Manchin, “we got that situation straightened out in about a day and a half,” Keller said. Under U.S. Customs and Border Protection policy, Customs agents can be assigned to an airport that lacks such a building if the airport is in the process of negotiating with the agency to have the building constructed — as quickly became the case with Yeager.
Scott Miller of Executive Air said Yeager is one of only a few Customs-served airports in the eastern United States with “easy-in, easy-out access” for international general aviation traffic seeking speedy service and few taxiway delays. “We’re in the running to become a major (general aviation) airport,” he said.
Currently, Yeager Airport serves about 10 international flights per month, including private passenger aircraft from Canada and Europe and cargo carriers bearing auto parts from Mexico.
Having a Customs agent on site also allows Air National Guard flights returning from overseas to fly directly to Yeager without first stopping at ports of entry like Dover, Delaware, to receive Customs clearance, according to Keller. “It saves the Air National Guard time and money,” he said.
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