Friday's Internet Edition, November 21, 2008.

An eight-passenger jet gets refueled during a Saturday afternoon stop at Boggs Field near Spencer. The occasion marked the first time a jet had landed at the local airport. GREG BOGGS PHOTO

On Saturday, a Citation 500 jet with a pair of Pratt and Whitney turbo-fan engines touched down to refuel at Boggs Field. It marked the first time that a jet had used the Spencer airport.

“It was exciting,” Boggs, co-manager of Boggs Aviation along with his brother, Richard, said. “It was the thought that we had reached a milestone in the development of the airport.”

Two pilots had flown the jet from Symrna, Tenn., to Teterboro, N.J., to drop off a passenger and were heading back to Tennessee when they stopped for fuel. Boggs said he thought the eight-passenger plane had been chartered for the trip.

The pilots had learned of the local airport online and radioed ahead to see if they would be able to refuel.

“One of them told Richard that it looked like somebody had done a good job (with the airport),” Boggs said. “They said they were going to come back, and that’s what you want.”

Work on the hilltop airport, which is located off Spring Creek Road near Nancy’s Run, began in 1997. Boggs’ father, Harry, made the first flight from the then-dirt runway a couple of years later when it was still unfinished.

Many improvements have been made since that time. Although privately owned by the Boggs family, the airport is open to public use at no charge.

The runway was paved in late spring of 2006 and now measures 4,550 feet long.

“It could be 6,500,” Boggs said. “But it’s long enough for the foreseeable future.”

The current runway was plenty long enough for the weekend visitors. The 11,850-pound Citation requires 2,300 feet to land and 2,600 feet for takeoff.

Although Boggs Field has been ready for jet traffic for nearly two years, it has largely been a well-kept secret.

“We didn’t really advertise it,” Boggs explained. “We’re still in the process of updating information with the FAA.”

The old listing for the airport stated that the runway was turf.

Local traffic at Boggs Field involves around 50 planes a month, Boggs said. He thinks jets may make the local airport busier, especially after the online information is updated and some planned improvements are completed.

Boggs said upgrading the airport’s weather station, adding instrument approach equipment for bad weather landings and painting reflective lines on the runway are priorities.

“If we had that, we really wouldn’t be longing for anything,” he said, “except more traffic.”

With its tank full of 560 gallons of jet fuel Saturday afternoon, the Citation roared into the blue sky with a sound even louder than that from the jet propeller-type aircraft and civilian and military jet helicopters that had used Boggs Field previously.

“It was loud,” Boggs recalled fondly, hoping for more of the same in the future. “We’re starting to see progress.”