Quote: “...........but would not say that South African is less safety conscious than Canada. “
Huh???? Who said or implied that SA is less safety conscious than Canada? If anybody attributes that to me on the basis of my post above then they need to reread and COMPREHEND that post or have a friend explain it to them.
This is not just a language or local politics issue, it is also a SAFETY issue. 176 died in the crash between a BA Trident and a DC-9 on 10 September 1976. A major contributing factor to this mid-air crash was: “The controller was speaking in Croatian to the Yugoslavian plane, which meant that the Trident crew was deprived of information that might have saved their lives.”
Similar concerns have been posted on this and other boards in the past, particularly about the use of French by controllers and pilots in France. Others are unable to understand and lose situational awareness, to the detriment of safety.
There have been other crashes and near misses worldwide because of the use of other than English. Should more be deliberately risked for local political reasons or should everything reasonably possible be done to remove unnecessary risks and improve aviation safety? When it comes to aviation one’s ability in languages other than English is irrelevant as for SAFETY only English should be used worldwide in aviation.
It is a sad commentary on present day Soviet Canuckistan that political expediency takes precedence over aviation SAFETY and common sense. Having said that, I will agree with a poster above that Canadian airspace is one of the safest. However, that safety is degraded in Quebec by the use of French purely for political expediency. This can and should be remedied without delay. Flight crews, the travelling public and (as demonstrated at Lockerbie) those on the ground deserve better.