Originally Posted by
Eutychus
I I freely admit to not understanding *all* the circumstances behind the situation, but I would like you to consider that *some* of the circumstances behind the situation might be better appraised by people who aren't pilots but who can bring an outside perspective with relevant expertise.
Therefore you are not aware of the vitally important aspect, as a non pilot, of situation awareness. Knowing who is doing what and when is crucial. The fact is it is English that was adopted as the Language of the air.
Originally Posted by
Eutychus
Like most surveys the outcome depends a lot on how the question is framed, and LinkedIn is hardly a respected polling organisaion seeking a representative sample, etc.
Thats why the question was framed as it was. Can you see any issue with the 'framing'? Feel free to put a poll up here and see what the reaction is, but dont hold your breath that the outcome from international pilots would be any different.
Originally Posted by
Eutychus
If you read upthread, you'll see I acknowledged some time ago that multiple languages certainly are a problem. The question that interests me, and that comes with my outside perspective, is whether replacing them in this setting with a single language might not run the risk of creating other, more serious problems.
It hasn't, unless someone knows differently, happened in, for example Germany.
Originally Posted by
Eutychus
By the way, an important point you haven't addressed upthread is that in the instance you cite at CDG in your opening post, the communication error was in English. Would you be happy accepting a universal aviation language that wasn't English?
If it was a requirement to speak Mandarin and you wanted to be a pilot...you would learn Standard RT Mandarin. I had to lean Mose Code. It's what you do. I taught Malaysian airline cadets, in Malaysia. I leant to speak Malay. I gave ground school and flight lessons in English.
Still unsure, here are some of the comments from the linked in poll
"
Absolutely degrading to safety."
"Situational Awareness (SA) is the key to a pilot’s survival. When you take a sense away (RT) you are lowering a pilot’s SA. When non-English RT is being used the risk increases. Proximate traffic speed/altitude info gets lost. Altimeter setting readings, wind reports, ATC frequencies all become useless to the non-lingual. This all has huge relevance to the world I’ve flown in over the last 30+ years and continues to increase as airspace useage intensifies. There is a good reason for being ICAO signatories; it’s called safety."
"You just have to fly regularly in to one of the Paris airports or places like Madrid / Rome when it’s busy and it becomes pretty clear what the effect multiple languages in ATC RT has, can have, on safety."
"It’s absolutely lethal."
"It is not just transmissions between ATC and Aircraft which must be carried out in one universal language. You will get transmissions BETWEEN aircraft too when required, especially when observations and messages need to be quickly passed. It always helps a crew to understand what is being said by other aircraft in the vicinity, especially near or on an airfield.
Communication saves lives."