The Bogue Field Committee was originally formed to work under the auspices of the Emerald Isle Board of Commissioners.  The mission was to work with the USMC to open up dialogue between the Town of Emerald Isle and the USMC to primarily address noise concerns surrounding the Marine Corps Auxiliary Landing Field (MCALF)Bogue.

As the committee began its work we quickly realized that as important as noise was, safety was much more of an issue than any of us had ever imagined.  What we did not realize was the opposition we would encounter once we brought these issues to light. Our Mayor, Barbara Harris, and three of the Commissioners, Pat McElraft, Jay Murphy and John Wootten did not like the path this committee was taking, so they disbanded the committee.  We reformed on our own in January, 2001 and began to advertise our concerns.  We now represent residents from Emerald Isle, Bogue, Cape Carteret, Swansboro, Morehead City and non-resident property owners that have very real concerns about the safety of the AV 8B Harrier flying over our homes, churches, daycares, shopping centers, etc.

About the time of our disbandment, the USMC started what they call JLUS.  This is the Joint Land Use Study.  This is a group from the USMC as well as  representatives from Carteret County, Craven County and local towns.  The purpose of the JLUS is to study encroachment issues in the towns surrounding the local military bases.  We contend that the JLUS is a day late and a dollar short and quite frankly are wondering why our elected officials are authorizing the expenditure of $19,500.00 of taxpayer dollars to support this venture.  The areas surrounding Bogue Field have already been built out.  Encroachment has already occurred.  The USMC and local officials should have done this study at least 20 years ago so that the land surrounding Bogue Field could have either been purchased by the military or zoned appropriately to handle encroachment issues.

On January 30, 2001, our group went to the JLUS meeting and made a presentation concerning the safety record of the AV 8B Harrier.  We were told that JLUS was not equipped to handle safety issues.  We found this somewhat surprising considering the fact that General Thomas Braaten, the Commander of Cherry Point, Havelock, NC is on the JLUS committee.  We asked questions concerning the safety record of the aircraft.  We also asked about the HaRP (Harrier Review Panel) and whether there was an update addressing all of the safety issues that the HaRP found to be in existence.  We were given no response from the military.  A copy of our presentation went to all of the local media.  The three (ABC, NBC & CBS) television stations visited our group for interviews.  We gave them some of our safety information and they indeed ran stories for a couple of days to try to help us get our information out to the public.

On Saturday, February 3, 2001 (4 days after our JLUS safety presentation) we received phone calls from all three of the television stations advising us that a Harrier had crashed at Cherry Point, NC killing the two pilots on board.  The news media asked if we would come to Cherry Point to give out more safety information.  Several of us indeed went to Cherry Point and expressed our concerns once again over the safety of this aircraft.  We are extremely concerned for the young men flying this plane when the federal government is not funding it properly.  However, we are very upset that this plane is flying over our families and our tourists since tourism is the economic driving force of Carteret County.  If a crash should occur in our area, we are not prepared or properly trained to handle such a tragedy.  Not only are we not prepared, our residents and tourists are not informed as to the levels of danger that a crash produces.  There is not any type of emergency plan in place, nor is there cross training taking place between our local rescue people and the crash, fire and rescue teams from Bogue Field.

What do we want?  We want the federal government to properly fund this plane so that safety is no longer an issue for these young pilots or for our families.   Knowing that is not likely, what do we want?  For the USMC to stop flying an unsafe airplane over highly populated areas.  You will later read about an AICUZ (Air Installation Compatible Use Zone) and an APZ (Accident Potential Zone).  Most of us are living in an area classified by the Department of the Navy (DoN) as "incompatible due to density and concentration of people."  We will explain that in further detail later, but basically it means the property that the majority of us live on should have never been developed and the USMC as well as the local officials did nothing to alert any of us as to the dangers of living in an APZ.  We have alerted national media and have news coverage in the process.

HISTORY