Boulder airport isn’t need for aerial disaster response
In March 2022, the NCAR fire burned 190 acres and threatened thousands of homes, including mine. I felt the shock of realizing we needed to evacuate.
I share our community’s understanding of the vital importance of emergency response and our immense gratitude to emergency personnel. So here’s some great news! Boulder will retain aerial disaster response capabilities regardless of what we decide to do with the Boulder Municipal Airport site (BDU).
As an organizer of the Boulderairportpetition.net, which calls for repurposing the 179-acre BDU site as beautiful new Boulder neighborhoods, I helped to ensure that our petition supports ongoing helicopter staging for emergency use at the site. BDU is used by helicopters for emergency medical, flood and fire response.
Fire-fighting planes, on the other hand, do not need BDU. Take it from Boulder Airport Manager, John Kinney, who told Boulder City Council on January 12, 2023, that planes that carry fire retardant are generally too big to use the Boulder airport’s runways, and instead use Rocky Mountain Metro Airport in Broomfield that has a fire retardant dispensing and mixing station. Or the City of Boulder’s wildland fire division chief, Brian Oliver. As described in a Boulder Reporting Lab article from July 17, 2023, “air tankers, which are planes that carry suppressant to put out fires, are based at the Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport. Oliver said the Boulder airport is useful for helicopters when fighting wildfires, but not necessary.”
Boulder is at a crossroads considering whether to repurpose the BDU site for beautiful mixeduse, mixed-income neighborhoods including sorely needed affordable housing. We at the Boulderairportpetition.net are proud to support continuing emergency helicopter uses in Boulder, at this site, no matter what the future holds.
I have lived in Boulder since 2008. I’m writing in my personal capacity.
— Laura Kaplan, Boulder