Occasionally, i hear airline guys/girls chatting on 121.5. I don't think it's professional when around busy UK airspace, but mid-altantic etc. ???.
JamesTK -do you know how VHF radio works? The Emirates Pilot who relayed messages for myself and D&D was somewhere way out over continental Europe at the time. He wasn't over the UK. In actual fact I couldn't hear the pilot in the UK who was also trying to help. The person helping me could just as easily have been out over the Atlantic.