English language-Airlines

mag3 wrote:
But some often struggle maintaining the high "cadence" standard set
primarily by US pilots and controllers. It follows therefore that some
non-native English speaking controllers might have the same difficulty,
the "native language" frequencies making it easier for both affected
pilots and controllers alike.

No hard data, but it always seemed to me that there are a lot more British
than American pilots out there (excluding purely domestic flights within
those two countries). I've had British pilots on flights between and within
countries on the far corners of the planet but rarely if ever American
unless flying a US airline (which rules out almost all destinations).

miguel
--
See the world from your web browser: http://travel.u.nu/

Quoting (Miguel Cruz) regarding English language-Airlines in
a message dated Sat, 29 Nov 2003 22:42:36 GMT:

mag3 wrote:
But some often struggle maintaining the high "cadence" standard set
primarily by US pilots and controllers. It follows therefore that some
non-native English speaking controllers might have the same difficulty,
the "native language" frequencies making it easier for both affected
pilots and controllers alike.

No hard data, but it always seemed to me that there are a lot more British
than American pilots out there (excluding purely domestic flights within
those two countries). I've had British pilots on flights between and within
countries on the far corners of the planet but rarely if ever American
unless flying a US airline (which rules out almost all destinations).

Perhaps there are more British pilots that fly worldwide than Americans now,
but I guess I was basing my observation on the ATC that I hear within the US.
I guess I was also recalling that passage in Tom Wolfe's "The Right Stuff"
where he talks about the origin of air/space travel being in the US "South"
(ie. Texas etc.) and hence, the initial concentration of pilots with "southern
drawl" setting that "cadance" standard.

Then again, I do have a DVD of HKG ops (Chek Lap Kok that is) where the tower
controllers are definitely British. EG. where an American Tower controller will
tell a pilot "{Airline XX} Position and Hold - {Runway} NN R/L" for pre-take
off instructions, the British controller will say "{Airline XX} Line up and
wait!"



__________________________________

Regards,
Arnold.

(E-mail address altered, to prevent spamming. :-|
Remove all asterisks and the *hates*spam* to get true address.)

"Sjoerd" wrote in message
...

"mag3" schreef in bericht
...
I wonder if that has anything to do with the country or the airline
maintaining
an FAA "Category 1" rating so as to have USA privileges. I'll have to
try
some
native foreign airlines that don't travel to the USA or have a US
presence.


MIAT Mongolian Airlines, Vietnam Airlines, Bangkok Airways, Myanmar
Airlines, Transavia, Easyjet, Merpati, Pluna, Air Berlin, are some of the
airlines that don't fly to the US and that I have flown, and announcements
in English were made on all of them. (although the announcements in
English
on Easyjet were hard to understand)

Sjoerd



Even in the Subway in Beijing (and as far as I remember also in Guangzhou)
are also made in English. The same holds true for road signs. So why not on
their planes?

On TG I have even once on a flight from Bangkok to Puket experienced
announcements in Thai, English - and Swedish!


Nik

"Mark Hewitt" wrote in message
...

"Graham Harrison" wrote in
message ...
Nope, all on one frequency. It's a perennial complaint amongst pilots
that
locals speak to one another in their native tongue. It's surprising
how
much situational awareness can be generated from knowing what other
people
are saying. If it's all in the same language then obviously everyone
benefits but even if different languages are used there are some clues
in
the reporting points being announced over the air.

There is also a perennial suspicion that local pilots get preference
over
non-local pilots and that using the local language helps to hide this
"bias".

I saw a documentary about this once. Apparently Air France issued an edict
that all pilots must talk to the tower in English. However the pilots
rebelled and AF had to reverse their decision.

Speaking French was blamed for a fatal crash at CDG when a plane was told
in
English to taxi onto a runway ready for take off. He didn't know that this
was a mistake because there was already an aircraft taking off on that
runway (thick fog meant visibility was poor). If they were all talking
English then the pilot would have known that there was already a takeoff
underway and would have questioned the command from ATC.



One question that should also be asked in this context is what standard of
English is expected from the "natives"? I ask this question because as a
non-native myself there are certain versions of English - certain Scottish
and Irish not to mention certain Australian versions of the English
language - that is very hard if not impossible for me to understand. When
complaining I have always been told that there are not such thing as
"standard English". This in spite of the fact that most dictionaries give a
pronunciation. To me it would be interesting to know if a person speaking
their local Birmingham accent (I never got to understand the locals even if
I stayed in the city for almost four months at one time) would be able to
work at an ATC tower without having to at least try imitate the language
spoken on BBC (even if standards there are degeneration too).

Nik

(although the announcements in English
on Easyjet were hard to understand)

Why? Poor quality intercom? FA speaking too quickly or
with a strange accent?


Casey

Whilst accent will always be an issue, there is supposed to be a standard
phraseology used by both pilots and controllers to overcome just such
problems. The "preferred pronunciation" even extends to specifying where
the stress should be placed on specific syllables.

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Col wrote:

Should be English everywhere I believe but some places 'let it slip'
sometimes.

It's not a case of letting it slip, but more a case of acknowledging
local reality and politics. It is understandable that people living in
a country and flying totally within that country would want to be able
to speak the local language for ease of communication, and as part of
nationalistic pride. Good examples in North America include Canada and
Mexico. French is accepted for flights operating in French speaking
areas of Canada, and Spanish is used in Mexico. This really acknowledges
that some general aviation pilots are not that proficient in English, as
well as recognizing the politics of language in those places.

I remember listening to the tower at AMS a few years ago and one of the KLM
pilots on approach started to talk in Dutch, he was kindly reminded by ATC
to speak in English.

That is simply local policy. In Quebec, as an example, air traffic
controllers will respond to the language a pilot uses on initial
contact, (French or English) and control the aircraft using that
language from that point on. There is therefore a mix of French and
English used for traffic control. Air Canada permits their pilots to
use either language as well, though they have to be proficient in
English.

R J Carpenter wrote:

From what I hear, "situational awareness" is VERY important to pilots. It
is considered important to know what the other traffic you are contending
with is doing. Controllers DO make mistakes and pilots want to be able to
complain or react.

That has been the argument in a couple of incidents. On the other hand,
there have been cases where the pilots were not proficient in English,
and miscommunication resulted in an accident. It turns both ways.

For this reason, many pilots consider it a DANGEROUS practice to air traffic
control to use other than English when speaking to non-English pilots.
Having separate frequencies and controllers for different languages would be
far, far, far worse.

In places that allow multi-lingual traffic control, they do not split
the frequencies. The controllers simply switch between languages as
needed. It has not proven particularly more dangerous than unilingual
traffic control.

Somewhere on the web you can find the recorded tower conversations
between the pilot of the JAL 747 that lost part of its tail and Tokyo
radar control. All of the conversations were made in English, as is
normal practice in Japan. I defy you to tell me that the conversations
are safer than if they had spoken to each other in Japanese. The
accents are so hard to understand, that I had to listen to a number of
sections several times before I understood what they were saying to each
other. At one point they did in fact switch to Japanese for clarity.

About 55 years ago English was adopted as the standard language for
aviation, that includes air traffic control. Yes, that standard is violated
in some countries. Also all important passenger announcement must be given
in English in addition to any other language. I've been on French charters
from Paris where I suspected I was the only native-English-speaker and all
important announcements were given in English as well as French.

English has become the "Lingua Franca" of the world. At one time, the
announcements might have been made in French. (Look in your passport,
and you will find instructions in French and English, as an
acknowledgment of the historic use of French as the diplomatic
language.)

what is spain like, are exchange rates good
for canadians.


Gary are you any relation to joey nichols in edmond ,oklahoma.

mag3 wrote:

I think English was adapted because of the historical American "roots" and
initial growth of the organized air travel industry.

Give credit to the British. Much of the world was connected by British
airlines, or airlines of Commonwealth countries flying to the far
reaches of the empire. The American operators (PanAm and TWA mostly)
came later. The British even operated local flights within places like
South America, where they had a strong economic presence. I suspect that
as a result, the original broadcast stations were set up by the airlines
themselves, and would have used English, since that was the company
language.

By all modern population & language standards, it should be
Spanish as it is the #3 language spoken worldwide by "population"
and #1 worldwide by "geographic distribution."

There is justification for using English, since it is the #1 language in
terms of the number of people who understand it worldwide, even if it
isn't their first language.

Also all important passenger announcement must be given
in English in addition to any other language.

I wonder if that has anything to do with the country or the airline maintaining
an FAA "Category 1" rating so as to have USA privileges. I'll have to try some
native foreign airlines that don't travel to the USA or have a US presence.

It's simply practicality, since English is broadly understood around the
world. It is not a requirement, and I've been on aircraft where only the
local language was used.