Local Briefs

New software is being evaluated that might reduce noise from airplanes flying over Peninsula residents on the way into San Francisco International Airport.

According to SFO spokesman Mike McCarron, SFO’s Aircraft Noise Abatement Office has been working with NASA, the Federal Aviation Administration, the Boeing Co. and United Airlines to develop the "Oceanic Tailored Arrivals’’ program for arriving trans-Pacific flights to the airport.

The OTA program would set up automatic computer control of arriving flights, allowing the planes to glide into their approach to the airport rather than changing altitude and power multiple times.

Using software developed by the NASA Ames Research Center, the FAA’s Oakland Air Route Traffic Control Center would upload the program to an aircraft’s on-board flight computer to fly the approach, McCarron said.

The software can be tailored to accommodate the specifics of each type of aircraft approaching the runway, he said.

In theory, OTAs could save fuel, effect more accurate arrival times, and simplify approaches for aircraft arriving after long flights from the Pacific Rim, according to McCarron. In addition, they could help air traffic controllers planning arrivals and reduce their workload, he said.

John Mark Karr

questioned, released in SF

San Francisco police briefly detained John Mark Karr Friday after employees of an elementary school where he briefly worked reported him stepping out of a limousine and peering into the school’s windows.

The incident occurred at Convent of the Sacred Heart at 2222 Broadway St. — less than two miles away from Karr’s attorney’s office, where a press conference was about to begin regarding Thursday’s dismissal of child pornography charges Karr faced in Sonoma County. Karr did not appear at the press conference. San Francisco police Sgt. Steve Mannina said that at 12:17 p.m., a worker called police and said Karr was in front of the school.

Thiefs targeting

catalytic converters

A wave of catalytic converter thefts has left sport utility vehicles running dirty and loud.

Over the past three months, dozens of SUVs have turned up in south San Francisco Bay Area auto shops with missing catalytic converters, part of a larger trend around the country. Toyota 4Runners seem to be a particularly popular target.

It’s obvious to mechanics what the problem is from the moment they roll into the shop.

"It sounds like a big piece of your exhaust system is missing,” said Brandi Turner at Luna’s Mufflers in San Jose, "because it is.”

Area mechanics speculate that thieves may be after the small amounts of precious metals such as platinum, rhodium or palladium that are in the 18-inch part. Catalytic converters pull pollutants out of unburned gasoline in the exhaust system.

Others disagree.

"That would be pretty rusted and pretty dirty” because the parts are so old, Toyota product administrator Bill Kwong said. "I can’t imagine there’d be a great deal of value in those metals.”

Kwong believes there is a market for used catalytic converters for early 1990s 4Runners in the area. It would make sense that if someone was going to steal the approximately $125-$500 part they’d take it from a truck.

"It’s higher up and easier to get under,” Kwong said.

Kwong recommends motion-sensor alarms in high-crime areas as a deterrent. Normal alarms, activated when a door or window is opened, won’t recognize a thief slipping underneath the car.

South City fire displaces four

A two-alarm fire in a two-story apartment building at 502 Commercial Ave. near Spruce Avenue has left four residents displaced, South San Francisco Battalion Chief Bob Green reported.

Firefighters responded to a call that came in at 3:40 p.m to find visible smoke and flames. Green says a second alarm was called due to reports that people were trapped in the building, Green said.

Eighteen adults and 10 children were displaced for the evening due to lingering smoke, but all were allowed to return home today except a family of four who have been "displaced indefinitely,” Green said.

The fire caused $250,000 in damage. The cause is still under investigation, Green said.

Second SF restaurant required to pay back wages

The owners of Golden Dragon, a San Francisco restaurant, will have to pay more than $1 million in back wages to employees and as much as $871,300 in costs after failing to pay 58 employees a legal wage from 2004 to 2006, according to the office of City Attorney Dennis Herrera.