Ignorant 'Blockers'!

[packsonflite]

Crossing the Atlantic last night, two Air France aircraft communicating on 123.45, were being deliberately blocked by one or two others keying open mikes. Not unreasonably as it was 123.45, the AF guys were speaking French.

One was attempting to get the other to pass on a position report as he was experiencing HF problems.

The blocking occured a total of three times and I'm quite certain that it was deliberate.

Whilst I quite understand the current head of steam about the use of French for ATC purposes, I think that the deliberate blocking of a frequency in this way is p*ss poor airmanship and childish in the extreme.

:mad: :mad:

[brokepilot]

Speaking French in an A/C should be a Crime!

[Notso Fantastic]

I can understand it. Few months ago 2 Rumanian aeroplanes over the Atlantic cackling away in foreign on the chat freq. Eventually John Wayne buts in: "would you cut that crap out!". I just thought 'I love America!'. Silence. Use of private foreign language is objectionable on a chat freq.

[Gantenbein]

Gentlemen,

I agree with packsonflite. Trying to keep aircraft from helping each other on the interpilot frequency because they speak a language that is different from your own is a ludricous display of lack of professionalism.
To those who agree with this, I ask:

Can you tell me why your are still listening to the interpilot frequency, since 123.45 (the former chat frequency for private pilots) has become the international standard? ‘Cackling away in foreign’ is quite acceptable on 123.45, since cackling away in English is, too.

Can you tell me why you have never complained about the cluttering of 121.5 in UK airspace?

It wouldn’t be because you are in fact not air transport professionals, now would it?

(edited because of a misinterpretation of the original posting)

[ 03 August 2001: Message edited by: Gantenbein ]

[Dan Winterland]

123.45 has never been an official chat freq for ppls. It is allocated to more than one agency in europe, and used to be the ICF for Anglia Radar.

[brokepilot]

As the Reg's state
you must speak English!

[slam_dunk]

Inter pilot freq. is there :
1. for operational purposes
2. If not busy to communicate with fellow aviators ( as long as it is a short conversation )
I don't care if someone uses his native language, as long as the message is short.
slam_dunk :D

[packsonflite]

Brokepilot,

You are completely wrong. There are five languages approved by ICAO. These are English, French, Spanish, Russian and Chinese.

Within states where the above languages are the official language, air traffic services must be provided in English, but the local language may be used by aircraft from nations where that alternate language is the official one.

Thus aircraft from French speaking nation may speak French to French controllers within French airspace or within the airspace of other French speaking nations. The same applies to the other ICAO approved languages. I may be slightly off on some of the detail above and stand open to correction.

As 123.45 is now officially approved as an pilot-to-pilot frequency worldwide when outside normal VHF coverage, pilots may speak whatever language they wish to use.

I do however agree with the view that all aircraft should use one common language for flight safety reasons. However, until ICAO change the rules, we all have to live with it.

Blocking transmission in the way I described, is just plain ignorant and doesn't advance flight safety arguement one jot.

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

[ 03 August 2001: Message edited by: packsonflite ]

[JJflyer]

Brokepilot... What regs would those be... FAR's ? Yes in USA English is the only official aviation communication language for ATC purposes.
ICAO allows local language to be used for communications. So 2 aircraft talking to each other in their own language is not against the regs, but on a frequency that is meant for other purposes than socializing, shows bad judgement.


When flying over the Atlantic I often hear Airline from my home country making pos reports on HF or using 123.45 for some function. When I talk to them I ask them to switch to a frequency that is not used in the area.
Do I think that English should be the only language allowed for aviation... Absolutely when there are pilots around that do not speak the national language. That is almost all the time and all over the world.

[brokepilot]

Packsonguy,
I know the ICAO BS. It was just a joke, calm down. just a slam on the French. but as for safety, one word (English)myself like lot's of Pilots have had to deal with non English speakers all over the world , It's not really safe. I'm glad that I do all of my flying in North America now!!!

[javelin]

And I suppose asking for the netball and rounders scores on 123.45 by half of the US fleet is acceptable ? I have heard these blocks before - pathetic. Now Cow noises, there's a different matter entirely :D By the way, what were all the star and planet references about 0400 Saturday over the atlantic - deteriorated into Uranus jokes of course !

[FL310]

Boys and girls, chill out...read your Notams...123.45 is allocated as a "chat" frequency (2 or 3 month back the Notam was published....)
Blocking this frequency is not only childish and very unprofessional, it may actually interfere with some important "chat".
:rolleyes:

[ironbutt57]

there's always one somewhere....this stupid practice was a regular "union boy" tactic during both the CO strike, then later at EAL NOT ENCOURAGED OR ENDORSED BY ALPO..to set the record straight, but nonetheless practiced by many less than professional airline pilots...over atc frequencies, but most commonly on company frequencies, blocking important transmissions such as weight and balance close-outs, stab and flap settings for take-off...not a good thing...

[Pirate]

Packsonflight

Things may have changed since I was involved in these things and please correct me if I'm wrong but my understanding was that there were originally four official ICAO languages, English, French, Spanish and Russian (not Chinese) and that Arabic was added as a fifth a few years ago.

[packsonflite]

Pirate - You may well be right, I was certain about the first four. However it does make you think about the other languages that are used and are not actually approved. I've heard Portuguese, Italian, Greek, Turkish, to name just a few. :(

[Cathar]

Packsonflite

You are correct, Chinese is now an official language of ICAO. However,the official languages are the working languages of ICAO and do not relate to ATC communications. As JJFlyer says ICAO does not require the use of English for ATC communications. If I remeber rightly (I haven't the relevant Annex to the Chicago Convention with me) the ICAO requirement is that ATC communications should be carried out in the language of the ground station but that communications must be available in english if requested by a pilot. While French ATC may deviate from what has become accepted practice they fully comply with the requirements of the relevant Annex.