Perry Mick wrote:

Just read this in Machine Design:

"The Eisenhower interstate system requires that one mile in
every five must be straight.  These straight sections are usable
as airstrips in times of war or other emergencies."

Another Urban Legend.  See, for example:

http://www.snopes2.com/autos/law/airstrip.htm

Claim:   The American interstate highway system was designed to be

used for

emergency airstrips in case of war.

Status:   False.

Origins:   Numerous folks swear Interstate highways in the United States
must be designed so that one mile in every five is perfectly straight and
flat.  According to this whispered bit of facetious lore, if the U.S.

ever

comes under attack, those straight, flat stretches will be used as

landing

strips.

Richard Weingroff, information liaison specialist for the Federal Highway
Administration's Office of Infrastructure and the FHA's unofficial
historian, says the closest any of this came to touching base with

reality

was in 1944, when Congress briefly considered the possibility of

including

funding for emergency landing strips in the Federal Highway-Aid Act

(the law

that authorized designation of a "National System of Interstate

Highways").

At no point was the idea kited of using highways or other roads to land
planes on; the proposed landing strips would have been built

alongside major

highways, with the highways serving to handle ground transportation

access

to and from these strips. The proposal was quickly dropped, and no

more was

ever heard of it.

Some references to the one-mile-in-five assertion claim it's part of the
Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956. This piece of legislation committed the
federal government to build what became the 42,800-mile Eisenhower
Interstate Highway System, which makes it the logical item to cite
concerning regulations about how the interstate highway system was to be
laid out. The act did not, however, contain any "one-in-five"

requirement,

nor did it even suggest the use of stretches of the interstate system as
emergency landing strips. The one-out-of-five rule was not part of

any later

legislation either.

At least two countries do use some of their roads as military air strips:
Korea and Sweden.

Barbara "strip mauled" Mikkelson

Last updated:   30 October 2000

The URL for this page is http://www.snopes.com/autos/law/airstrip.htm

Urban Legends Reference Pages © 1995-2001
by Barbara and David P. Mikkelson
This material may not be reproduced without permission

Sources:
The Miama Herald.   "Nation's Interstate Highways Exemplify Bumps in
Freedom's Road."  The Tampa Tribune.   9 July 1996   (p. 7).

Weingroff, Richard.   "One Mile in Five: Debunking the Myth."
Public Roads.   May 2000.

Amazing what you can learn on the internet!

I still maintain it's better to land your Long-EZ on the interstate
than in a mountainous area or a muddy or rough field.  The only
concern is traffic.  At least on the interstate both lanes are going
the same direction.  Trying to land on a country highway with
occassional cars going both directions would be worse.  Car drivers
aren't used to looking up and may not see you.  I think in the rural
remote west this will work.  Although I-5 is pretty dense with
cars all along it's route.

I think the Lyc drivers, which comprise 99.9% of the EZ fleet,
should be more concerned about this than me.  Bruce Tifft and
his wife are dead because of overconfidence in the Lycoming
power plant.

--
Perry Mick
Duckt N7XR
http://www.ductedfan.com

Perry,
I hate to say bad things about the dead but Bruce put that motor
together VERY wrong with totally non-aircraft, non-Lyc parts
and took off on about the second flight after overhaul with a full load
for a long cross country.  The non-std, way-too-tight pistons seized
as they came up to temp, and there was no suitable landing
area in the mountainous terrain he was flying over.  A tragedy, but
the culprit was NOT Lyc in this case.  I know of many other
cases where Lyc or Cont ARE at fault, but not this one. A real shame
as he was a pretty nice guy and certainly didn't deserve to die, but
this is another one of the reasons that I contribute to this newsletter -
to help keep people from getting hurt while pursuing the sport of
experimental aviation.  It can be done with relative safety, but it
requires diligence to avoid attempting to violate the laws of physics.
Let's all try to learn from other's mistakes.  Sometimes the lessons
were *extremely* expensive.

Remember:  1)  The laws of physics will be strickly enforced.
                    2) You can't get a waiver.
                    3)  Ignorance of the law is no excuse.

Just keeping the record straight.  BTW, I agree 100% with your
strategy, and I avoid getting beyond gliding range of a highway in
unfriendly terrain.  Fortunately for us, the Long EZ has a good
glide ratio.  Instant "nearest airport" is one heck of a NAV feature,
too.  Been there, done that, didn't like it.  ;-)

Bill Freeman
Long EZ builder & pilot
BSME, MSME
EAA Technical Counselor

Aircraft piston engines are high strung and totally unforgiving of
any kind of error when over hauling or operating. They are right out there
on the bleeding edge.

Paul Lamar
 
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