I first came to Vernon in 1960 as a cadet. When we went to Kin Beach to go swimming we drove past the airport. The airport had been there since the 1940s and was still there when I last came to the camp four years later. I worked at Mica Creek from 1966 to 1968 and got a pilot’s licence at Mica from a flying school run out of the Vernon airport, and would come to Vernon on weekends for some of the training. We moved to Vernon in 1974, and the airport was still there. Every year there was more and more activity at the airport as it expanded to serve the community. In 2006 we built on a piece of property overlooking the airport. The real estate agent told us of the airport a few hundred metres away I told him it was not a problem as I was looking forward to an air show every day. There is always something going on down there and always interesting to pause and watch. Yes, I hear the plane that is circling, when it goes quiet I know to look up and watch some normally rational people jump out of a perfectly good plane — go figure! But that is just one of the things going on at today’s airport. This provides a young pilot with a way to get hours, fees for the airport, wages for the maintenance of the plane, gas, etc. Sure there are noises associated with an airport, as with any industrial enterprise, and at the airport they are very brief. So I guess what I am trying to say is the airport has been here for 70 years — isn’t it a little late to complain now?
Richard Payne, Vernon
