To the editor: As a general aviation pilot who has flown in and out of Hollywood Burbank Airport hundreds of times, I find this article unnecessarily frightening to the flying public (“Why some fear Burbank airport is an accident waiting to happen. ‘Everybody has had concerns,’” Feb. 6). Nowhere in the article is there mention of the fact that no pilot can be in this airspace without radio contact with Air Traffic Control. The air traffic controllers, these unseen heroes of the aviation system, know exactly where everyone is because all airplanes, including the trainers at Van Nuys, have transponders that emit a signal that is visible to ATC on the radar.
For as busy as the airspace is, I have found it remarkably safe. Van Nuys planes land and take off north-south. Landing planes at Burbank almost always come from the west and cannot descend below 3,000 feet until they have crossed the Van Nuys runways.
I see this article as creating unneeded worry to the flying public and the people on the ground. And after hundreds of thousands of flights over decades, how many midair collisions have there been in this airspace? I believe none.
Doug Jones, Los Feliz
