STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (WTAJ) – During a press conference for Penn State Football, Head Coach James Franklin talked about the team leaving a day early for their cross-country trip to take on USC because the State College Regional Airport wasn't fit for the lengthy trip.
He said the team couldn't fly out of State College due to runway length, size of the plane, weight of the plane and fuel on the plane. He added that they could have only flown out if they had stopped for fuel. Due to these issues, the team instead bussed to Harrisburg International Airport which added two hours to an already six-hour flight.
These issues do not usually occur as the team does regularly fly out of the airport for games. However, Franklin explained the incident took up an entire day so he chose to leave Thursday rather than Friday for the USC game.
Franklin said this topic was discussed with the Big Ten as teams considered joining but now the airport needs to make changes for the entire community.
“That's one of the things I think we have to discuss is increasing the size of the runway here and the size of the airport for a lot of reasons, for the university, for the community, for businesses, for the athletic department, and for us now that we've, you know, decided to make this move as a Big Ten, to me, that something that we need to do,” Coach Franklin said.
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Franklin also added that the changes with the ability not to fly out of State College changed a lot for the team compared to other teams in the Big Ten.
The University sent the following statement:
The State College Regional Airport does currently accommodate large narrow-body aircraft, with weight limitations, up to and including the Boeing 757, with restrictions related to maximum payload and fuel capacity (so a long-haul non-stop route—e.g., West Coast—would not be possible).
The current length of the runway is 6,701 feet. The current Airport Master Plan, developed prior to the Big Ten expansion to include west coast teams, identifies an extension of 1,500 feet for a runway length of 8,201 feet.
A longer runway would be an ideal final outcome.
Nexstar's WTAJ also reached out to the Centre County Airport Authority for a statement:
A runway extension has been discussed in the past as part of long term planning efforts at the Airport, most recently in 2016 through the Airport’s Master Plan. Although the Master Plan does indicate a runway extension may be appropriate at some time in the future, there is currently insufficient overall demand to justify the expenditure of public funds for this particular improvement.
The Authority’s current priority is to pursue funding that could be used for the addition of passenger boarding bridges, providing environmental friendly access to the Airport from
I-99, or towards efforts to increase scheduled airline service, as just a few examples. The CCAA is committed to working with the University to maximize available funding and provide the best possible experience to all users of the Airport.
CCA
The CCAA is the owner/operator of the airline terminal facility and Penn State is the owner/operator of the State College Regional Airport.