Qualla: Naval Outlying Landing Field Coupeville

Naval Outlying Landing Field Coupeville: Introduction

Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Scott Taylor, Public domain. You hear NOLF Coupeville before you see it. The sound of an EA-18G Growler on final approach is not the distant hum of commercial aviation -- it is a physical force, a wall of noise that rattles windows and sends dogs under beds miles from the runway. The Navy commissioned this outlying landing field in 1943, a grass strip carved into the prairie two miles southeast of Coupeville on Whidbey Island. Eight decades later, it remains one of the most contentious pieces of military real estate in the Pacific Northwest, a place where national defense collides with historic preservation, endangered species, and the patience of everyone who lives within earshot.

Image: U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Scott Taylor | Public domain

Naval Outlying Landing Field Coupeville: Practicing for the Deck

Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Joe A Kunzler, CC BY-SA 3.0. The purpose of NOLF Coupeville is singular and specific: Field Carrier Landing Practice. Naval aviators and their crews fly patterns over the field, descend to the runway, touch down on a painted line that simulates an arrestor wire, then immediately throttle up and climb away to...

Image: Joe A Kunzler | CC BY-SA 3.0

Naval Outlying Landing Field Coupeville: The Sound and the Fury

Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Scott Taylor, Public domain. Jet noise has been an intermittent controversy since the field transitioned to higher-performance aircraft, but the arrival of the EA-18G Growler escalated the conflict dramatically. In July 2013, a local citizens' group filed a lawsuit demanding an Environmental Impact Study exa...

Image: U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Scott Taylor | Public domain

Naval Outlying Landing Field Coupeville: Reserve Versus Runway

Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Scott Taylor, Public domain. What makes the NOLF Coupeville dispute unusual is not the noise itself -- military communities across the country deal with jet noise -- but the location. The field sits within the boundaries of Ebey's Landing National Historical Reserve, the first such designation in the United ...

Image: U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Scott Taylor | Public domain

Naval Outlying Landing Field Coupeville: Eighty Years on the Prairie

Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Scott Taylor, Public domain. NOLF Coupeville nearly touches State Route 20, the main road across Whidbey Island, and sits about ten miles south of NAS Whidbey Island, the Navy's primary installation in the area. Driving past on SR-20, the field is easy to miss when it is quiet -- a flat expanse of grass and ...

Image: U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Scott Taylor | Public domain