The Air Force releases its latest plan to intensify training in Arizona

The public may review and comment on the draft Arizona Regional Special Use Airspace Optimization Environmental Impact Statement online at arizonaregionalairspaceeis.com. Comments will be accepted until October 9.

The Air Force has scheduled a series of public hearings on the draft environmental statement from late August to mid-September in Ajo, Bagdad, Morenci and Superior, as well as four communities in New Mexico. Virtual hearings are scheduled for Sept. 4 and 5. A hearing schedule is also available at arizonaregionalairspaceeis.com.

The draft declaration is similar to an initial proposal presented in 2022 and discussed at a series of public exploratory meetings.

The Air Force says it received more than 6,600 comments from the public, state and local agencies, tribes, aviation groups and nonprofits, including many raising safety, health and environmental concerns.

The service explains that the changes to the special airspaces known as Military Operations Areas (MOAs) are necessary to optimize the training of units at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Morris Air National Guard Base at Tucson International Airport and Luke Air Force Base near Phoenix.

The proposed changes would affect the adjacent Sells, Ruby, and Fuzzy MOAs, which extend southwest of Tucson from Interstate 19 to near Ajo; the Tombstone MOA, which covers the southeastern corner of Arizona and the southwestern corner of New Mexico; the adjacent Bagdad and Gladden MOAs northwest of Phoenix; and the Outlaw, Jackal, Morenci, and Reserve MOAs, which together extend across a vast swath from east-central Arizona to New Mexico.

In its preferred alternative, the Air Force has proposed adjusting the “published operating times” for all affected MOAs, in part to eliminate some of the temporary “advice to pilots” that the Air Force currently routinely issues for night training.

Other changes to the alternative proposed by the Air Force include:

• Authorize supersonic flight speeds to 5,000 feet above ground level in the Tombstone, Outlaw, Jackal, Morenci, and Reserve MOAs, currently 30,000 feet above sea level;
• Expanding the northern boundary of the Tombstone MOA, which extends from the southeastern corner of Arizona and the southwestern corner of New Mexico to the Mexican border, by approximately 750 square miles;
• Lowering the flight floor of the Tombstone MOA to 100 feet above the ground and lowering the floors of the Outlaw, Jackal, Bagdad and Gladden MOAs to 500 feet;
• Authorized for the first time the use of chaff – metalized threads fired from aircraft to confuse enemy radars – in the Tombstone MOA;
• Reduce the minimum altitude for firing flares used to counter heat-seeking missiles to 2,000 feet in the Tombstone, Outlaw, Jackal, Bagdad, and Gladden MOAs.

The plan has faced opposition from residents in the affected areas, who point to potential health and safety impacts from supersonic flights at lower altitudes, environmental impacts from the exercises such as pollution from chaff emissions, and the risk of forest fires from flares, although the Air Force says they extinguish themselves long before they reach the ground.

In May, the Center for Biological Diversity sued the Air Force under the Freedom of Information Act for failing to release public records about the proposed expansion of military flights. The center pointed out that the plan would affect millions of acres of the Gila Wilderness and other public lands in southeastern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico.

Peaceful Chiricahua Skies, a nonprofit group with members in Arizona and New Mexico, is concerned about the impacts to the Chiricahua Mountains and the Chiricahua National Monument area in Cochise County – which are partially covered by the Tombstone MOA.

The group said the latest plan calls for a significant increase in the total number of flights, including an increase from an average of 3,450 to 8,000 sorties, or round-trips, per year in the Tombstone MOA alone.

Overall, the Air Force intends to increase its annual flight training missions by approximately 37%, from the current average of approximately 38,000 across all MOAs to an expected 52,000 annually.

“This DEIS (draft environmental impact statement) will be a great disappointment to the many concerned citizens who previously submitted comments opposing the expansion of noisy, low-flying training flights over residential, commercial and wilderness areas in southeastern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico,” said Karen Fasimpaur, a volunteer with Peaceful Chiricahua Skies.

Fasimpaur also criticized the Air Force for failing to schedule one of the upcoming public hearings in Cochise County, even though doing so could have implications.

Peaceful Chiricahua Skies and another group, Peaceful Gila Skies, also filed petitions against the Air Force’s plans as well as a small air park northwest of Phoenix.

The Air Force statement said the planned actions would not have significant environmental or socioeconomic impacts.

The Air Force rejected two alternative proposals that were largely consistent with the preferred plan, except that one would have maintained the current Tombstone MOA without extension and the other would have allowed supersonic flight only up to 10,000 feet.