Extremely minor aviation pet peeves...

Velocity173 said:
Pilots that use the term “interrogative.” @Timbeck2
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Even if it's a valid interrogative?
  • τίς -- This is a Koine Greek interrogative. Usually used at the beginning of a sentence to indicate it's a question. Just one of many.
Wow language skills. Not just for teachers to ruin your weekends with homework.
 
Clip4 said:
The official FAA term is Apron. The Webster dictionary doesn’t include part of an airport under its definition of Apron.

I suspect Tarmac is a term left over from the days of grass runways and the area planes were parked were paved pads so you weren’t in the mud to load and unload.
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I prefer "apron", however, both "apron' and "ramp" are referred to in AC 150/5300-13A. I roll my eyes when someone says "tarmac".

Other than that, next time that I hear someone say "last call" on the radio, I'm keying my mic and requesting a vodka martini.
 
Fearless Tower said:
When I went through Helicopter Control Officer school at Chambers Field back in the day, I noticed that a lot of the Aircrew referred to the helicopters as ‘airplanes’. Thought that sounded weird.
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HEL-I-COP-TER has too many syllables for Alabamians, which is where Army and Air Force types learn all that flyin stuff.
 
Lindberg said:
People who write "bravo," "charlie," and "delta" instead of "B," "C," and "D."
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Along these lines, pilots who, when writing down the ATIS information, write out the phonetic alphabet letter on their kneeboard/iPad/whatever. Information "Sierra". Obviously this is because they never learned the phonetic alphabet well enough to remember it.
 
IK04 said:
HEL-I-COP-TER has too many syllables for Alabamians, which is where Army and Air Force types learn all that flyin stuff.
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Sometimes pronounced helicopeters y'all...
 
Using aircraft color at uncontrolled fields. Most planes are white, and do you really think we can see your blue pinstripe to call yourself white and blue cessna.

People that use the pilot voice on frequency. The overzealous happy sounding guy. No one is that happy first thing in the morning. Or the low tone “I’m a cool pilot” voice.

Pilots that have to throw some sort of airplane or flying comment in every situation. You and some friends are at the strip club and that one guy has to say that her boobs is looks like the nose of a 757.
 
"I've been around airplanes for 40 years so that makes you wrong!"
 
I really like those spirals painted on the spinners of old warbird planes. It annoys me that more people don’t do it. But only minorly.
 
Oh, and the term ‘a high rate of speed.’ Okay so he was accelerating quickly, but was he flying fast?
 
-People who think "roger" means "yes".

-Having different phraseology for aviation and the fire service. I fly a lot more than I run fire calls, so I naturally want to use "roger" & "willco", but those confuse dispatchers who aren't used to using them. I also tend to readback instructions and always want to end with a callsign, neither of which hurt anything, but sounds unusual. Coincidentally, many in the fire service seem to think "10-4" also means "yes".

-People not using the NATO alphabet. Always some salesperson on the phone...."'s' as in 'sam'?"....."yes 's' as in 'sierra'"......"huh?"
 
Jim K said:
-People who think "roger" means "yes".

-Having different phraseology for aviation and the fire service. I fly a lot more than I run fire calls, so I naturally want to use "roger" & "willco", but those confuse dispatchers who aren't used to using them. I also tend to readback instructions and always want to end with a callsign, neither of which hurt anything, but sounds unusual. Coincidentally, many in the fire service seem to think "10-4" also means "yes".

-People not using the NATO alphabet. Always some salesperson on the phone...."'s' as in 'sam'?"....."yes 's' as in 'sierra'"......"huh?"
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Roger that!
 
TommyG said:
Using aircraft color at uncontrolled fields. Most planes are white, and do you really think we can see your blue pinstripe to call yourself white and blue cessna
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That is almost as useless as using the tail number, which no one can read in the pattern.
 
Roger, Wilco, over and out.

like fingernails on a chalkboard. But umm, still not ah as bad ummm…..as the guy who um doesn’t think ah, about what um he’s going to ah say before he um clicks the mic.
 
Palmpilot said:
You don't have to be able to read the tail numbers to form a mental picture of the pattern.

Tail numbers are unique. Colors may or may not be.
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You don't need to be able to see the colors either, which was the complaint.
 
Lindberg said:
You don't need to be able to see the colors either, which was the complaint.
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I think the point may have been:

White Cessna taking off runway 17. While that's happening. White Cessna turning cross wind and White Cessna downwind midfield, and white Cessna base.

VS.

Cessna 123A taking off runway 17. While that's happening Cessna 456B turning crosswind and Cessna 789C downwind midfield and Cessna 00Z base.

In the latter scenario there are 4 distinct Cessna's, In the former depending on the timing of each call there could be 1, 2, 3 or even 4 White Cessnas. In either case I probably can't make out the color or the tail number of the aircraft.
 
szwinger said:
In the latter scenario there are 4 distinct Cessna's, In the former depending on the timing of each call there could be 1, 2, 3 or even 4 White Cessnas. In either case I probably can't make out the color or the tail number of the aircraft.
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I used to be a fan of the "Color of airplane" method, reasoning like others, that I couldn't see the tail number anyway. Until I realized, of course that something like 80%* of airplanes that would make this kind of call (i.e. flight school trainers) are white. And of course, much of the time you can't tell the color anyway.

While we can't read the tail numbers either, at least that lets you keep track of who's where. "Okay, Cessna 123 reported downwind a minute ago, so they're about to report base, Cessna 456 just called taking off..." etc. You can keep track that way.

* totally pulled out of my nether regions, of course
 
szwinger said:
I think the point may have been:

White Cessna taking off runway 17. While that's happening. White Cessna turning cross wind and White Cessna downwind midfield, and white Cessna base.
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I don't think so.

TommyG said:
Using aircraft color at uncontrolled fields. Most planes are white, and do you really think we can see your blue pinstripe to call yourself white and blue cessna.
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RussR said:
I used to be a fan of the "Color of airplane" method, reasoning like others, that I couldn't see the tail number anyway. Until I realized, of course that something like 80%* of airplanes that would make this kind of call (i.e. flight school trainers) are white. And of course, much of the time you can't tell the color anyway.

While we can't read the tail numbers either, at least that lets you keep track of who's where. "Okay, Cessna 123 reported downwind a minute ago, so they're about to report base, Cessna 456 just called taking off..." etc. You can keep track that way.

* totally pulled out of my nether regions, of course
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To be honest, I use neither color or tail number when forming my mental picture of the pattern. I usually go by voice, type and where I expect them to be in the pattern. If I ever get a professional impressionist that can't remember what plane their flying, I might pay more attention.

I suppose the only time I might otherwise correlate color or tail number is if I'm at the hold short line watching someone land.
 
I just don’t get where this whole color thing came from. I’ve been flying almost 30 years, and this color garbage only started about 10to 15 years ago where I am at.
 
When approaching an airport it would be more helpful to announce distance & minutes till arrival i.e. "5 miles, 2 minutes - caution wake turbulence" ... OK only kidding on the wake turbulence part. :)

Time to arrival seems more important than distance as someone may not know your speed. If approaching at 130 knots the time factor will be very different than approaching at 60 knots. I fly experimental airplanes and some are much faster than others.
 
Daleandee said:
When approaching an airport it would be more helpful to announce distance & minutes till arrival i.e. "5 miles, 2 minutes - caution wake turbulence" ... OK only kidding on the wake turbulence part. :)

Time to arrival seems more important than distance as someone may not know your speed. If approaching at 130 knots the time factor will be very different than approaching at 60 knots. I fly experimental airplanes and some are much faster than others.
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You do realize that some pilots out there make Forrest Gump look a rocket scientist. You want minutes, some can’t even figure out what runway to land.
 
TommyG said:
You want minutes, some can’t even figure out what runway to land.
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Nothing against foreigners but we've had a few that had such horrible English speaking skills that about all I could get was that they were somewhere near the airport I was approaching. The last time this happened I spotted them on the runway doing what must have been a stop & go.

But we also get some real redneck pilots and their articulation of the English language is sometimes quite difficult to decipher. "10-4 good buddy!" ;)
 
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szwinger said:
So if I would have said White and Blue Cessna I’d be on point?
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If there were multiple white and blue Cessnas in your imaginary pattern and all of them were using that moniker, then yes. Otherwise, any unique identifier should be enough to build your SA. There's nothing magical about tail numbers, it's just what the FCC wants us to use. When towing gliders, I'll often say "Tow Plane XYZ" rather than Piper, so folks know to watch out for the 300' of rope and possibly nonstandard pattern. Do what you need to do to get the message across and be safe.
 
Flair/Flare
When somebody says they're turning to a "left final"
Ending a CTAF call with "xyz traffic"
 
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