LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Re: The Death of Common Sense: Common sense has been driven out of most airports, but it does still exist here in the boondocks. If the runways are grass — or dirt — and the aircraft do not have radios, or they are not used too much, and the pilots cannot tell you what the instruments actually said when they were flying — only that the gauges were all in the green and things sounded right and the pilot had all the passengers looking for traffic and if the sun was out and the aircraft occupants saw their shadow on the ground with no others near and the pilots all made sure they did not run into anyone or anything in front of them, then common sense is present and accounted for.
But don’t tell anybody or they will come and see the busy traffic pattern and declare that a control tower is needed, so one is put in, like the one years ago in North Oklahoma City, which forced all the small airplanes to move to an uncontrolled field, which resulted in too little traffic to justify a tower but it was not removed.
When common sense is forced out by regulations —- or any other cause (I won’t say reason) — you get what you described. I really believe the situation could be reversed.
BOB PARK, via e-mail
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