Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

As aviation-gas lead drops over Serra Mesa...

"Small planes take off and land over and over — those are flight schools."

A 2014 lawsuit won by Oakland's Center for Environmental Health seems not to have affected operations at Montgomery Field.
A 2014 lawsuit won by Oakland's Center for Environmental Health seems not to have affected operations at Montgomery Field.

Usually when people complain about small regional airports, the issue is noise. But Serra Mesa resident Gary Keller is worried about lead poisoning, and a California health coalition — supported by EPA research — says his concerns are valid.

Significance of colors overlaid on map above

"Far more insidious is the fact that the small piston-driven engines that make up most of your fleet continue to burn Avgas,” he said. “Serra Mesa has the most elementary schools, daycare facilities, and most minority children of the areas near the airport, and we should be protecting them.”

Sponsored
Sponsored

Avgas is now recognized as the leading source of lead in air pollution — putting about 500 tons of the toxic heavy metal in the air each year. Lead is part of the fuel formula because it is believed to enhance engine performance. It’s also a major focus for people concerned about environmental health says Caroline Cox, research director with the Center for Environmental Health in Oakland.

In 2014, the center settled a lawsuit over the ongoing use of leaded aviation gas brought against 30 California companies that sell or distribute Avgas at 23 California airports, including Montgomery and Brown Fields.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes for Health, lead is a well-documented neurotoxicant that is particularly harmful to children. Serious harm to cognitive and behavioral functions (including intelligence, attention, and motor skills) has been demonstrated in children with much less lead in their blood than previously thought to cause harm, and it has been determined that there is no safe level of lead exposure.

“Every year we identify causal links to more and more health problems that are caused by lead,” Cox said. “Lead is cumulative; a child who lives near an airport where it’s used, in an old house with lead-based paint and drinks water that carries lead from the pipes is looking at a lifetime of health issues.”

Avgas is used primarily by small planes — jet fuel is completely different — and some helicopters.

“It’s primarily used in recreation aviation,” said Cox, “but it’s also used in air ambulances and firefighting — and those are powerful political voices. If you watch the flight trackers near airports like Montgomery, you see the small planes take off and land and take off and land, over and over — those are flight schools, and their maneuvers burn especially high amounts of Avgas.”

The Federal Aviation Administration and the EPA are supposed to announce their plans to phase out Avgas in 2018, but Cox says they don’t appear to be on track to be able to do that. One of the biggest challenges is that the planes used for recreation are as much as 50 years old and still flying, she said.

“Leaded fuel in cars was phased out by the late 1980s as the old cars wore out and people bought cars built to run on unleaded gas,” Cox said.

Serra Mesa resident Gary Keller noted that the airport does encourage pilots, who usually take off westbound, to turn right — north — instead of circling south over Serra Mesa.

“Flying schools, flying clubs, and touring aircraft choose to go left and bring the noise and lead pollution with them,” he said. “You could be rock stars and get them to not fly over and pollute our neighborhoods.”

The airport advisory board that heard Keller's remarks couldn't respond to them at the meeting because state law forbids acting on anything that isn't on the current meeting agenda. The open-meetings law is supposed to ensure that the public is notified of issues we're concerned about before the meeting so we have the chance to participate in the discussion.

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

The Digital Currency Wave Hits the Shores of San Diego

A 2014 lawsuit won by Oakland's Center for Environmental Health seems not to have affected operations at Montgomery Field.
A 2014 lawsuit won by Oakland's Center for Environmental Health seems not to have affected operations at Montgomery Field.

Usually when people complain about small regional airports, the issue is noise. But Serra Mesa resident Gary Keller is worried about lead poisoning, and a California health coalition — supported by EPA research — says his concerns are valid.

Significance of colors overlaid on map above

"Far more insidious is the fact that the small piston-driven engines that make up most of your fleet continue to burn Avgas,” he said. “Serra Mesa has the most elementary schools, daycare facilities, and most minority children of the areas near the airport, and we should be protecting them.”

Sponsored
Sponsored

Avgas is now recognized as the leading source of lead in air pollution — putting about 500 tons of the toxic heavy metal in the air each year. Lead is part of the fuel formula because it is believed to enhance engine performance. It’s also a major focus for people concerned about environmental health says Caroline Cox, research director with the Center for Environmental Health in Oakland.

In 2014, the center settled a lawsuit over the ongoing use of leaded aviation gas brought against 30 California companies that sell or distribute Avgas at 23 California airports, including Montgomery and Brown Fields.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes for Health, lead is a well-documented neurotoxicant that is particularly harmful to children. Serious harm to cognitive and behavioral functions (including intelligence, attention, and motor skills) has been demonstrated in children with much less lead in their blood than previously thought to cause harm, and it has been determined that there is no safe level of lead exposure.

“Every year we identify causal links to more and more health problems that are caused by lead,” Cox said. “Lead is cumulative; a child who lives near an airport where it’s used, in an old house with lead-based paint and drinks water that carries lead from the pipes is looking at a lifetime of health issues.”

Avgas is used primarily by small planes — jet fuel is completely different — and some helicopters.

“It’s primarily used in recreation aviation,” said Cox, “but it’s also used in air ambulances and firefighting — and those are powerful political voices. If you watch the flight trackers near airports like Montgomery, you see the small planes take off and land and take off and land, over and over — those are flight schools, and their maneuvers burn especially high amounts of Avgas.”

The Federal Aviation Administration and the EPA are supposed to announce their plans to phase out Avgas in 2018, but Cox says they don’t appear to be on track to be able to do that. One of the biggest challenges is that the planes used for recreation are as much as 50 years old and still flying, she said.

“Leaded fuel in cars was phased out by the late 1980s as the old cars wore out and people bought cars built to run on unleaded gas,” Cox said.

Serra Mesa resident Gary Keller noted that the airport does encourage pilots, who usually take off westbound, to turn right — north — instead of circling south over Serra Mesa.

“Flying schools, flying clubs, and touring aircraft choose to go left and bring the noise and lead pollution with them,” he said. “You could be rock stars and get them to not fly over and pollute our neighborhoods.”

The airport advisory board that heard Keller's remarks couldn't respond to them at the meeting because state law forbids acting on anything that isn't on the current meeting agenda. The open-meetings law is supposed to ensure that the public is notified of issues we're concerned about before the meeting so we have the chance to participate in the discussion.

Comments
Sponsored
Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Taco Taco Poway still has 99-cent fish tacos

Tacotopia prizewinner is well known among Powegians
Next Article

Dating Sites For Little People: Best Platforms & Tips

Comments
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.