Language overriding a restriction preventing Yeager Airport from receiving money through a federal disaster aid law to pay for rebuilding its EMAS (engineered materials arresting system) bed near the site of the March 2015 safety overrun collapse has been included in the $1 trillion omnibus spending bill to fund government operations through the rest of the fiscal year.
The additional wording, worked out through an agreement between Rep. Evan Jenkins, R-W.Va., who serves on the House Appropriations Committee, and Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa., chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, was included in the spending bill approved by House and Senate appropriators early Monday, making the Charleston airport eligible to receive $14 million in federal aid to pay for a new EMAS bed.
"Language in a current law basically makes emergency funding to pay for the EMAS area unavailable to Yeager, due to a unique set of circumstances," Jenkins said.
During a meeting with Shuster, Jenkins identified sections of the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act that prohibited the use of federal disaster funds to rebuild the safety feature at the Charleston airport and "literally drew a picture of what happened at Yeager on the back of an envelope" to help explain the landslide's impact, he said.
"Chairman Shuster signed off on the additional language, which now makes Yeager Airport eligible for EMAS repair funding," if the spending bill clears both the House, where a vote is expected on Wednesday, and the Senate, which must vote by midnight Friday to avert a government shutdown.
If passed, the $14 million would cover the cost of building a new EMAS bed at south end of the runway, where the previous system brought a regional jet with 34 people aboard to a safe stop during an aborted takeoff run in 2010. Under an "interim" runway improvement plan developed by the airport, construction of a 37-foot-tall retaining wall based on a terrace at the south end of the runway would create 100 additional feet of safety overrun area at runway grade to accommodate the EMAS bed. With the EMAS now gone, a 500-foot portion of the runway has been closed to air traffic to serve as a temporary safety overrun area, giving aircraft traveling to and from the Charleston airport less distance for departures and landings.
The EMAS is a runway-wide bed of specially engineered concrete blocks designed to fracture and crumble if an airplane overruns the runway and rolls onto it, much in the way a runaway truck ramp filled with crushed rock brings trucks to safe stops along steep highway grades.
"The EMAS area has proven itself to be a lifesaver at Yeager and we need to restore it help keep things safe for the traveling public and the men and women of the Air National Guard," Jenkins said.
"We are certainly optimistic about our chances of receiving some funding" for the new EMAS bed, Yeager Airport Director Terry Sayre said on Monday, while en route to a meeting in Washington on Tuesday with Federal Aviation Administration officials to discuss the interim runway improvement plan. Sayre praised Jenkins and Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., "who have worked tirelessly on our behalf, for getting this language into the bill, which will allow the FAA to fund the rebuild."
Yeager Airport officials are exploring a long-term, $175 million plan to extend the runway to 8,000 feet by adding fill to a section of Coonskin Park at the north end of the existing runway. The $14 million restoration of the EMAS bed would be the first phase of that plan.
Jenkins work on behalf of Yeager took place despite the fact that the Charleston airport lies outside the Third Congressional District, which he represents.
Reach Rick Steelhammer at rsteelhammer@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-5169 or follow @rsteelhammer on Twitter.