COURTLAND -- Nearly 700 residents of rural Southside Virginia turned out last night to plan a counterattack against a Navy proposal to build a practice field for its noisy jets.

The organizer of the group, Tony Clark, read the biblical story of David and Goliath to the crowd and predicted a similar upset victory against the Navy.

Barry Steinberg, a Washington lawyer hired by the counties of Sussex, Surry and Southampton, vowed to question all aspects of the Navy's plan, from the potential effect of jet noise on livestock to the question of whether an airfield would be finished before a new generation of Navy jets renders it obsolete.

Outside the crowded Southampton High School auditorium, members of the group sold T-shirts, stickers, yard signs and ball caps with messages of opposition to a landing field. Several county supervisors and state legislators, and a representative of Rep. J. Randy Forbes, R-4th, attended to show support for the group.

An outlying landing field would bring few jobs or tax dollars to its host locality, only the roar of jets day and night. It would consist mainly of an airstrip, control tower and fire station in the midst of 30,000 vacant acres.

The Navy is considering five sites, including two that straddle the line between Sussex and Southampton; one in Surry near the Prince George County line; and two in North Carolina. The Navy is preparing to begin a detailed environmental study of the sites and will hold public hearings in each county.

The Navy has tried since the late 1990s to find a place for the practice airfield in a lightly populated area where F/A-18 Hornet and Super Hornet jets from Oceana Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach could practice noisy, repetitious, low-altitude landing drills while disturbing as few people as possible.

The drills currently take place at Oceana and at nearby Fentress Naval Auxiliary Landing Field in Chesapeake. Both fields have been encroached upon by the suburbs in recent years. Residents routinely complain about jet noise; the Navy complains the suburban sprawl has limited the fields' effectiveness for pilot training.

Suburban encroachment on Oceana prompted the 2005 military base-closing commission to threaten to move Oceana's 150 jets and the accompanying 14,000 jobs out of Virginia Beach. That has not happened. But state officials say helping the Navy find a spot for an outlying field can relieve the pressure and protect the future of Oceana, a pillar of the local economy.

The Navy says a new outlying field is critical for training its pilots in the difficult skill of landing on the decks of aircraft carriers. Oceana is the Navy's main East Coast jet base, and its jet squadrons routinely deploy on carriers around the world.

In 2001, the Navy set out to build the outlying field in rural Washington County, N.C. But farmers and environmental groups stalled the project with lawsuits and then slowly rallied enough support in Congress to force the Navy to look elsewhere.

In June, the Navy asked the governors of Virginia and North Carolina to help find a place for the outlying field. Gov. Timothy M. Kaine's office nominated 10 potential sites in rural eastern Virginia. Boards of supervisors in each county quickly voted to ask the Navy to look elsewhere. In the fall, the Navy narrowed the choices to the three in Virginia and two in North Carolina.

Clark, chairman of the group Virginians Against the Outlying Landing Field, said the Navy has tried to stress the potential economic benefits of the field, including construction costs and more than 50 full-time jobs.

But those benefits pale against the potential noise and disruption of jets roaring across the Southside skies, Clark said. He said many in the potentially affected farm communities think they are being asked to forfeit their rural solitude to fix a problem caused by runaway development in Virginia Beach and Chesapeake.

Contact Bill Geroux at (757) 498-2820 or bgeroux@timesdispatch.com.