South Lewis County Airport , also known as Ed Carlson Memorial Field, is a county-owned public-use

airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial Aviation, air transport. They usually consist of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surf ...

in Lewis County,

Washington Washington most commonly refers to: * George Washington (1732–1799), the first president of the United States * Washington (state), a state in the Pacific Northwest of the United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A ...

, United States. It is located three

nautical mile A nautical mile is a unit of length used in air, marine, and space navigation, and for the definition of territorial waters. Historically, it was defined as the meridian arc length corresponding to one minute ( of a degree) of latitude at t ...

s (4 mi, 6 km) north of the

central business district A central business district (CBD) is the Commerce, commercial and business center of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides wit ...

Toledo, Washington Toledo is a city in Lewis County, Washington, United States. The population was 631 at the 2020 census. The community is home to an annual Cheese Days festival that celebrates the town's dairy history. Etymology The area underwent several na ...

. This airport is included in the FAA's

National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems The National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems (NPIAS) is an inventory of U.S. aviation infrastructure assets. With the Airport and Airway Improvement Act of September 3, 1982, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) was required to develop a ...

for 2011–2015, which categorized it as a ''

general aviation General aviation (GA) is defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) as all civil aviation aircraft operations except for commercial air transport or aerial work, which is defined as specialized aviation services for other ...

'' facility.

History

The airport is listed as a "public use general aviation airport" that serves Toledo and the surrounding community and region. Partially federally funded, the airfield is required to submit layout and master plans every five years. The field is also used as a primary staging site during natural disasters, providing flight access for emergency and military personnel. It was renamed in honor of Ed Carlson, a long-serving board member of the airfield. The airport was formerly a joint venture between Toledo, Winlock, and the county. The cooperative was formed by a commission in 1950 and lasted until December 2001 when the South Lewis County Airport Board was created to manage the facility.

20th century

South Lewis County Airport began as a airstrip in 1940. Constructed by the Civil Aeronautics Administration, the more challenging

crosswind A crosswind is any wind that has a perpendicular component to the line or direction of travel. This affects the aerodynamics of many forms of transport. Moving non- parallel to the wind direction creates a crosswind component on the object and t ...

runway was built for pilot training and was accompanied by a communication tower in May 1941. Land for the airport was purchased outside Toledo by the city of Winlock in 1939 and a grass runway was constructed. Known originally as the Toledo-Winlock Airport, South Lewis County Airport began as a airstrip beginning in 1940. Constructed by the Civil Aeronautics Administration, the runway was built to train pilots in crosswinds and was accompanied by a communication tower in May 1941. The strip was lengthened to and widened to for military planes in 1942. The airport, since its inception, was known for its "Toledo Light", a rotating beacon used to guide aircraft; the light had been in existence since the 1920s as part of a nationwide lighthouse system. The Toledo-Winlock Airport was a possible site for a maintenance hub for

Northwest Airlines Northwest Airlines (often abbreviated as NWA) was a major airline in the United States that operated from 1926 until it Delta Air Lines–Northwest Airlines merger, merged with Delta Air Lines in 2010. The merger made Delta the largest airline ...

and to be of potential use for the Portland Interceptive Command, a joint Army-Navy Reserve flight operation based out of

Portland, Oregon Portland ( ) is the List of cities in Oregon, most populous city in the U.S. state of Oregon, located in the Pacific Northwest region. Situated close to northwest Oregon at the confluence of the Willamette River, Willamette and Columbia River, ...

. Neither attempt was successful. Another consideration of the airport failed in 1964, when

Boeing The Boeing Company, or simply Boeing (), is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and product support s ...

considered the airstrip as a landing gear test site for its 707 aircraft; the runway was considered unsuitable. In mid-1975, airspace over the airport was used to test noise levels of a new

DC-9 The McDonnell Douglas DC-9 is an American five-abreast, single-aisle aircraft designed by the Douglas Aircraft Company. It was initially produced as the Douglas DC-9 prior to August 1967, after which point the company had merged with McDonnell A ...

Series 50 jetliner; the

McDonnell Douglas McDonnell Douglas Corporation was a major American Aerospace manufacturer, aerospace manufacturing corporation and defense contractor, formed by the merger of McDonnell Aircraft and the Douglas Aircraft Company in 1967. Between then and its own ...

aircraft, due to weight and the length of the airstrip, did not use the landing strip. The FAA, which had oversight of the airport since 1958, made several attempts to close the airfield's flight information station. The first effort began in 1964 and was suspected to be due to funding concerns. The station survived and became known as the Toledo Flight Service Station but concerns over maintenance costs, and citing improved technology and reduced usage of the monitoring facility, led to another closure attempt in late 1972 and into 1973. During the closure attempts, the airport was to install a lighted homing beacon in 1974 but was delayed by the FAA. After lawsuits and postponements, the FAA decided in September 1976 to keep the flight information station open but with severely reduced hours and staffing. The reduction was postponed but made official by February 1977. Equipment for an En Route Flight Advisory Service system was installed during the delay. The airport was the closest airfield during the

1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens In March 1980, a series of volcanic explosions and pyroclastic flows began at Mount St. Helens in Skamania County, Washington, United States. A series of Phreatic eruption, phreatic blasts occurred from the summit and escalated until a major ...

and served as an important center for search-and-rescue operations in the aftermath. A temporary

morgue A morgue or mortuary (in a hospital or elsewhere) is a place used for the storage of human corpses awaiting identification (ID), removal for autopsy, respectful burial, cremation or other methods of disposal. In modern times, corpses have cu ...

was constructed at the airport during the early operations after the eruption.

21st century

In December 2001, the communities of Toledo and Winlock officially transferred ownership of the airport to the county. A group students from the Toledo Middle School's Students Against Destructive Decisions (SADD) helped to overhaul and improve the grounds and facilities during a late spring two-week effort in 2003. Later that year, the airport received a $1.2 million grant from the FAA for the repaving of the runway, maintaining its width; the project was completed and dedicated by the end of the year. In 2005, the airfield was the site of an attempted record-breaking tandem parachute jump. Falling short of the mark of 128, it set a regional record of 117 instead. A $3.2 million project to upgrade the airport was undertaken and completed in 2020. Primarily funded by the FAA, the runway was repainted and the taxiway was rebuilt to average in width and new lighting was installed. Also during 2020, Lewis County proposed Ed Carlson Memorial Field as a potential site for a state initiative to build a new commercial airport in

Western Washington Western Washington is a region of the United States defined as the area of Washington State west of the Cascade Mountains. This region is home to the state's largest city, Seattle, the state capital, Olympia, and most of the state's residents. ...

and was officially considered the following year. A group of residents in the Toledo area formed a group to oppose the consideration on the merits of protecting the rural environment in the region with additional concerns regarding increases in crime, pollution, and traffic congestion. Despite the airport being one of six finalists, due to public objections, the airfield was removed from consideration and was not among the final options by August 2022.

Accidents and incidents

The airport was the last to be in contact with a Marine Corps Curtiss R5C Commando that crashed approximately away on the afternoon of December 10, 1946. The station at Toledo authorized clearance for the aircraft to climb to a higher elevation due to icy conditions; contact ceased quickly thereafter and 32 men were lost.

Facilities and aircraft

The airport covers an area of 95

acre The acre ( ) is a Unit of measurement, unit of land area used in the Imperial units, British imperial and the United States customary units#Area, United States customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one Chain (unit), ch ...

s (38 ha) at an

elevation The elevation of a geographic location (geography), ''location'' is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational equipotenti ...

of 374 feet (114 m) above

mean sea level A mean is a quantity representing the "center" of a collection of numbers and is intermediate to the extreme values of the set of numbers. There are several kinds of means (or "measures of central tendency") in mathematics, especially in statist ...

. It has one

runway In aviation, a runway is an elongated, rectangular surface designed for the landing and takeoff of an aircraft. Runways may be a human-made surface (often asphalt concrete, asphalt, concrete, or a mixture of both) or a natural surface (sod, ...

designated 6/24 with an

asphalt Asphalt most often refers to: * Bitumen, also known as "liquid asphalt cement" or simply "asphalt", a viscous form of petroleum mainly used as a binder in asphalt concrete * Asphalt concrete, a mixture of bitumen with coarse and fine aggregates, u ...

surface measuring 4,479 by 150 feet (1,365 x 46 m). When the county took sole-ownership of the field, agreements were offered for tenants to rent parcels on the grounds. Renters could then build hangars on their contracted plat, maintaining ownership of any structure during the lease. However, improvements were then forfeited to the airport once the original rental contract ended. A 2018 budget report listed eight hangars on the grounds and 15 tie-down sites. Reports in 1969 recorded approximately 3,000 aircraft operations. In 2012, operations were estimated to include over 16,000 flights, for an average of 45 per day. For the 12-month period ending December 31, 2020, the airport had 8,300 aircraft operations, an average of 23 per day: 97%

and 2%

military A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. Militaries are typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with their members identifiable by a d ...

. In the 21st century, aircraft based at the airport were reported as 66 in 2003 and by 2016, included 36 single-

engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power ge ...

, 6 multi-engine, the permission to host one jet and an allowable increase of helicopters on the ground from two to three. In 2020, 40 aircraft based at this airport: 38 single-engine, and 2 multi-engine. The airport owns an undeveloped parcel set aside for future expansion of the airfield and its facilities.

Training and flight programs

South Lewis County Airport is home to the Toledo Flying Club, a membership organization that began in 1938, though officially in 1940, and offers flight instructions to participants. One of the founding members was a Toledo school teacher, Cecelia Earhart, a cousin of

Amelia Earhart Amelia Mary Earhart ( ; July 24, 1897 – January 5, 1939) was an American aviation pioneer. On July 2, 1937, she disappeared over the Pacific Ocean while attempting to become the first female pilot to circumnavigate the world. During her li ...

. The flying club is the oldest of its kind in the state and was host to a fly-in during the 1960s and 1970s that coincided with a local

threshing Threshing or thrashing is the process of loosening the edible part of grain (or other crop) from the straw to which it is attached. It is the step in grain preparation after reaping. Threshing does not remove the bran from the grain. History of ...

bee festival. The airfield, beginning in 1972, has been host to a skydiving school, first known as the Toledo Parachute Center.

Economy

, the South Lewis County Airport had a budget of over $3.2 million, with expenditures approximately the same. The airport supports one full-time position.

References

External links

*
Lewis County - Ed Carlson Memorial Field - South Lewis County Airport (TDO)

WSDOT - Ed Carlson Memorial - South Lewis County
{{Airports in Washington Lewis County, Washington Toledo, Washington Airports in Washington (state) Transportation buildings and structures in Lewis County, Washington