Director details airport snafus

By Ed Runyan

runyan@vindy.com

VIENNA

A problem with a pipe inside the Youngstown- Warren Regional Airport caused sewage to back up and onto the floor throughout the airport terminal Feb. 9, causing as much as $100,000 in damage.

Dan Dickten, aviation director, said the backup occurred at a busy time — starting about 5:30 p.m. when the airport was full of airline passengers.

Dickten said the backup was caused by a blockage in the pipe, which carries sewage out of the building to a manhole on the side of the building.

The blockage caused sewage to overflow from toilets and floor drains in several locations, flooding the floor throughout the terminal.

Dickten spent more than four hours mopping up the sewage himself throughout the evening. The water caused damage to floors, drywall, furniture and other items.

Erinn Rogers, the accounting and business manager for the airport, increased the airport’s flood insurance from $10,000 to $100,000 a month before the flood, which most likely prevented the airport from having to pay any of the cleanup costs out of pocket, Dickten said.

The airport submitted a project to the Federal Aviation Administration using fees charged to airline customers to replace the 4-inch sewer line that became clogged, Dickten said. The airport submitted the project before the flood, he added.

Meanwhile, Dickten and the airport’s maintenance and operations department experienced another setback when the airport’s new Kodiak snow broom arrived late last month.

The motorized device sweeps the snow off of runways.

The broom, which costs $430,000, needed a repair within days of its arrival because the teeth on a pinion gear in the back of the sweeper broke off while a Kodiak representative was training employees on the device.

The broom was out of service two weeks for repairs. Then on Tuesday, employees discovered a problem with a gearbox.

In all, the equipment has been in use for only a couple of days since it arrived, prompting members of the Western Reserve Port Authority, which runs the airport, to question Dickten and the board’s attorney, Dan Keating, as to whether it makes sense to return the equipment and buy something else.

In other business, the port authority received a free presentation from an attorney with the Columbus law firm Bricker and Eckler on ethics and public-meetings laws as they relate to public bodies such as the port authority.

The presentation was part of an hours-long retreat Wednesday at the Youngstown Business Incubator.