Japan Press Weekly

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2013 February 6 - 12 [US FORCES]

Residents’ complaints about US military aircraft noise increase

The number of complaints from residents about the excessive noise caused by U.S. military aircraft has sharply increased in Gunma prefecture.

During the 10 months since the start of this fiscal year in April, the prefectural government has already received 514 complaints. The total number of complaints in FY2010 was 526 and 600 in FY2011.

The number of complaints filed to the prefecture in January alone reached 314, the second largest since the prefecture started compiling data in 1999.

Every year from January to March, U.S. carrier-borne fighters conduct flight training over Gunma Prefecture. Since last year, more and more flight training exercises have taken place during the time when normally people enjoy dinner and watch TV with family members.

On January 22 when the U.S. military conducted training in the evening, the number of residents’ complaints was the highest in the month. The prefectural and municipal governments on January 22 and 23 received 107 complaints.

The Japanese Communist Party together with peace groups have proposed that a system to monitor noise levels from U.S. military aircraft be established in the prefecture and Maebashi City where citizens suffer from severer noise pollution by U.S. aircraft than other municipalities in the prefecture.

Chair of the JCP Maebashi City Assembly members’ group Nakamichi Namiko said, “The large number of complaints indicates how strong residents’ anger is. We will call on the prefectural and the city governments to take further steps to deal with this issue.”

The Maebashi City Assembly in March 2010 unanimously adopted a JCP-submitted statement urging the U.S. forces to stop low-altitude flight training exercises.