I have owned a home in Dugualla Bay since 1989, and would like to address the issue of noise levels in our area; as it exists now and compared to a gravel surface mine.

Current ambience is that of a quiet countryside with the loudest sound being the birds and the occasional car. Aircraft noise from Whidbey NAS is in the form of fly-bys, which last an average of 30 seconds. In the last 30 days I counted 182 such fly-bys, which equals a total of 90 minutes. This is less than one-quarter of one-percent of a month’s time.

The ambient noise level pollution from a gravel surface mine would be a constant mixture of diesel operations extracting, crushing, and loading equipment, as well as heavy trucking. The time duration of this pollution would be 11 hours per day, six days per week, 25 days per month, or 275 hours. This is in excess of 38 percent of a month’s time.

I sincerely hope this puts in perspective just one of the many extreme concerns we, as a residential community, have with the intrusion of a commercial open pit mine in our area.

Jim Walters

Oak Harbor