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Watching the Planes

© Eugenia E. Gratto

My husband and I live just a mile from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, and when the weather is right, we can hear the planes warming up in the morning.

The sound seems to be loudest in the mornings, just around sunrise. The best place to hear them is in our upstairs bathroom—the sound filters down through our ceiling fan.

But most of the time, the noise doesn't bother me that much. That's not the case, though for the members of Citizens for the Abatement of Airport Noise, a local group fighting for quieter airports, less pollution and more safety at both National and Washington Dulles International Airport, which is approximately 30 miles from my house.

But the noise of the airplanes in my bathroom is nothing compared to the experience of visiting Gravelly Point, just north of National Airport's main runway along the Potomac. The spot is just off the northbound George Washington Parkway and along the Mount Vernon Trail (a 19-mile hiking and biking trail that runs from Roosevelt Island to Mount Vernon). The safety wall at the end of the runway is just 250 feet across a small stretch of water from the point, and the planes are no more than 75 feet over your head as they take off and land. It's an amazing place to feel the power of the aviation age.

My husband and I went on a picnic just north of Gravelly Point after we'd been dating about a year. It was a lovely summer evening, our spot had a perfect view of the Jefferson Memorial, and he had picked out a great menu of food to share. But about every 90 seconds, a jet passing by overhead interrupted our romantic reverie. Take this as a warning—come to Gravelly Point to see the jets, not hear the people with whom you are there.

There are plenty of flights to watch, too. According to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, 25,000 flights took off or landed during June 2000. Congress has limited the number of flights allowed to take off from the airport each day, but every year it seems like Arizona Senator John McCain proposes adding more flights in and out of this already jam-packed airport. Many area residents think it's just downright dangerous to add more flights to this airport, and I tend to agree, especially as I watch how quickly the planes follow each other in and out of the airport. There's not a lot of room for error.