Tag: #landslide

Charleston airport officials have proposed a $290 million emergency infrastructure project for rebuilding and extending Yeager Airport’s runway following a 2015 landslide at the safety-overrun area.

The Charleston Gazette-Mail reports the proposal calls for lengthening the runway from about 6,800 feet to 8,000 feet, and adding 1,000-foot safety zones at each end.

Officials presented the plan last week to Nick Casey, Gov. Jim Justice’s chief of staff, in hopes of having the governor submit it for inclusion on the federal government’s High Priority Infrastructure Projects list. Projects on the list receive an expedited environmental review.

Almost all of the added runway and safety zone space would come from county-owned Coonskin Park.

No one was injured in the March 2015 landslide, which took out a church and an unoccupied house.

A road has been cleared of debris from a 2015 landslide at Yeager Airport’s safety-overrun area.

The Charleston Gazette-Mail reports the last of the debris has been removed from the Kanawha County road below the hilltop airport. Officials are now awaiting action by the state Division of Highways to reopen it.

Airport executive director Terry Sayre told the airport board Wednesday new drainage culverts have been installed under the road and a nearby parking lot where a church once stood.

The airport has spent about $4.1 million to clear 540,000 cubic yards of earth and rock.

No one was injured in the landslide. Several homes acquired by the airport along the road were torn down.

Work on clearing what remains of Yeager Airport’s collapsed safety overrun area will be on hold until protocols for collecting samples of materials from the slide for use as evidence in pending lawsuits are worked out in Kanawha Circuit Court.

Yeager Executive Director Terry Sayre says guidelines for conducting such forensic tests will be taken up during an April 13 status hearing. Until sampling procedures are agreed upon, no slide removal work can be done.

Finance Committee Chairman Trip Shumate says a recent audit showed the safety overrun collapse reduced the airport’s value by $18.27 million.

Also on hold is an $8 million taxiway rehabilitation project already approved and 90-percent funded by the Federal Aviation Administration, due to uncertainty about obtaining the $800,000 in matching funds needed to get the project under contract.

A Charleston woman has pleaded guilty to falsely obtaining benefits meant for residents forced out of their homes by a landslide at Yeager Airport.

The Charleston Gazette-Mail reports that 28-year-old Lindsey Marie Meadows pleaded guilty on Monday to obtaining under false pretenses. She’s scheduled to be sentenced Jan. 22 in Kanawha County Circuit Court.

Meadows told Judge Joanna Tabit that she obtained money from the airport by falsely saying that she was a resident of Keystone Drive.

Yeager’s man-made emergency overrun area partially collapsed on March 12. The airport provided cash grants and hotel accommodations to residents whose homes on Keystone Drive were damaged.

Assistant Kanawha County prosecutor Jennifer Gordon says Meadows received $1,500 from the airport, which also paid $1,800 for her stay at a hotel.

Yeager Airport officials are seeking state funding of up to $35 million to rebuild a landslide-prone hill near the airport.

The Charleston Gazette-Mail reports they’re prepared to ask Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin and legislators to tap the state’s so-called rainy day fund for $25 million to $35 million. That is the sum they believe is needed to begin rebuilding the safety-overrun zone that collapsed in a March 12 landslide.

Ed Hill is chairman of the airport’s governing board, and he said Thursday the airport can’t wait for insurance and lawsuit settlements to begin the work.

He cited an incident four years ago when the safety overrun stopped a jet carrying 34 on during an aborted takeoff.

The state’s two Rainy Day Funds had nearly $858 million as of September.