The pilot said "smoke in the cockpit" and then gave his flight number. What part of that did the controller not understand.
How freaking hard is it to say 'MAYDAY, MAYDAY, MAYDAY, UNITED 5912, UNITED 5912, UNITED 5912, smoke in cockpit, require emergency services'? It'd take a nano second longer than comms indicated in the OP and would be clear and unambiguous to the ATCO.
I know it's Aviate, navigate, communicate but there are times when the communicate needs to be very clear in order to not further complicate the next bit of aviating and navigating that needs to be accomplished. Communication in this event sounds like it was NOT clear which made subsequent aviating (evacuating the aircraft with emergency services already rolling) much more difficult.
but are dogpiled on by armchair nitpickers who probably never got closer to a real emergency than their last sim session....
Lol. You get stuck into those of us who indicate that standard phraseology may have resulted int a much better outcome in these circumstances and accuse us of monday morning quarter backing whilst at the same time presuming that those of us who comment haven't experience emergencies of our own.
If we don't learn from these things then what freaking hope does aviation have?