King County International Airport GRE Feasibility Assessment
Seattle, Washington
King County International Airport (KIA) is a large general aviation airport situated within the city limits of Seattle, WA. To minimize community noise impact, a number of noise abatement procedures are used.
In an effort to better understand the impact of installing a Ground Run-up Enclosure (GRE) at KIA, Wyle modeled a 747-400 at full power in each of the three locations identified, both with and without the GRE in place. The model used for this analysis was a modified version of Wyle’s Noise Model Simulation (NMSim) model which takes into consideration source strength and directivity, spherical spreading, atmospheric attenuation, terrain effects, and barrier effects.
Because of the high population density near the airport, small changes in the noise contour can result in large changes in the affected population. If a GRE is built at KIA, the study showed that locating it at Site 1 would result in the lowest number of people affected by run-up noise. The study also revealed Site 2 to be the best location to do engine run-up tests without adding a GRE. .