Haneytown man says Base Gagetown helicopters affecting health

Richard Jones of Haneytown says military helicopters flying too low, too often near his home, are causing him to lose sleepand ruining the area where he grew up.

"I want to sell and move," said the 58-year-old. "I want to sell everything I got and get out out of here."

He said the helicopters from Base Gagetown, parked on the other side of the highway,are loud, fly dangerously low and shine a blinding light into the homes in the area.

He said it's a consistent problem and, depending on the training, can last all night.

Hasn't changed

"They said they would have the helicopters not fly over my house again," he said. "That has never stopped.

"They were flying over top of my house this morning in circles in the fog," he said. "You could hardly see them. Treetop high. It's just looking for an accident."

A statement from the base on Wednesday suggested that Jones may have to put up with the helicopters and that the operations did not violate federal airspace policies.

"To maintain training realism and to meet training standards, it is necessary to employ all combat arms weapons in both day and night scenarios," said Capt.EvelyneLemire, senior public affairs officer at BaseGagetown.

Lemire also stated the base's restricted airspace extends beyond the land boundary of the base.

The base commander and other officials looked into Jones's concerns and "concluded that our operations comply with all applicable federal airspace policies and procedures," said Lemire.

"Base Gagetownrecognizes that training noise, at times amplified by certain weather patterns such as low cloud ceiling levels, may cause disturbances to the public and proactively informs its surrounding communities of training periods that may cause extraordinary levels of noise," said Lemire.

"However, the nature of our national mandate is such that we cannot mitigate all noise that results from training our nation's military."

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The base was built in 1958, but Jones said he's been calling to complain about the helicopters for 15 years.

Collecting video

Last year, Jones started filming what he saw. He has hundreds of videos, he said.

He believes what's happening is harassment.

"I knew there was going to be a day coming that I am going to have a lawyer look at this," he said. "It's affecting my health."

Helicopter fly-bys

8 years ago

Duration 0:44

Base neighbour annoyed by noiseWhile he has called the base many times, it never results in change, he said.

Jones, who paints and fills cracks, said the lack of sleep is affecting his work.

I want to sell everything I got and get out out of here.- Richard Jones, Haneytown resident

"It's helicopters 24-7," he said. "I come home and want to sleep."

He'd like the base to adopt a cutoff time, when helicopters stop taking flight.

"I'd like them to realize people have to get up in the morning and go to work."