Archive: News

County Officials gathered late yesterday to announce that the Ithaca Tompkins Regional Airport (ITH) will be moving to a 140 acre parcel of land across the street from the Lansing Town Hall.  According to the town's representative to the Tompkins County Legislature Pat Pryor, radiation from a small former Cornell nuclear facility has grown to the point where it is no longer safe for the airport to remain in its current location.  Due to cuts in State and federal aid to municipalities, Pryor says Tompkins County can't afford to replace the entire existing 531 acre facility.  But Airport Manager Robert Nicholas says advances in aviation technology will make the new airport perfectly safe.

"Largely because of technological advances in composite aircraft construction, the new jets need only a fraction of the length of runway that the old planes needed," Nicholas says.  "The new airport will also be equipped with large mattress-like devices to protect neighboring homes, just in case."

Officials say the decision to move the airport was made because of increasing radiation from a nearby hazardous waste location.  After a small nuclear reactor owned by Cornell University on the east side of the airport was closed down in 2001 it was discovered that the 500-kilowatt device that had been used for teaching purposes was leaking.  Federal and local officials have thought for years that the radiation was contained, but a recent test showed that cracks in a concrete retaining wall have allowed possibly fatal amounts of radiation to seep into the atmosphere.  Because of a geographical anomaly, winds loop around the facility, spraying radiation westward across the runway and directly toward the terminal.

"That gives the word 'terminal' a new and chilling context," Pryor says.  "Not to mention telling passengers to prepare for landing at their 'final destination'.  It would be irresponsible to leave the airport in its current location."

The announcement left Lansing officials stunned.  Lansing Councilmen have been working for years to get deed restrictions lifted on the parcel in order to locate a town center there.  Recently the Lansing Pathways Committee opened a walking path that residents have enjoyed for cross country skiing this winter.  All of that will be gone when the airport moves.

"It's a terrible blow," says Town Councilwoman Kathy Miller, who is the chairwoman of the Lansing Town Center Committee.  "We'll have to entirely rethink the location of the Town Center.  We will probably have get the Fire District to relocate Central Station so we can put a Town Center on their property.  While it's not ideal, they have that big field behind the station, and water service there is terrific.  They even have a hydrant."

Nicholas says that construction of the new runways will begin immediately, and plans to move the current terminal building and control tower to the new location are part of an emergency plan that has been in place since the nuclear facility was first built in the early 1960s.  The terminal will be trucked to the new location in four sections.

"While the new airport is being completed we will be providing passengers at the current facility with aluminum foil to protect them from the radiation," Nicholas says.  "Our passenger's safety is our primary concern."

That sent TSA agents scrambling to come up with a plan to adjust security scanners to scan through the foil, and trying to assure that scanners are not affected by the radiation.  TSA agents and airline employees will be wearing full body radiation suits starting Monday.

Yes, this is an April Fools Day article.  None of the quotes or 'facts' presented in this article are true.  Enjoy this silly day.

v7i13