Heard over the past two nights over a LON frequency dealing with oceanic traffic I/B from US, after extended comms requiring level changes due moderate trubulence:

US a/c (eastbound): "Errr, London, the chop is much lighter at this level".
Female ATCO (sounding fascinated ;) ): "Yyyepp!"

This morning, very much same occurence, apparently the ride at FL390 wasn't too smooth, with some flights again requesting level changes:

US a/c (eastbound again): "London, the ride is smoother at FL370, thanks a lot"
ATCO: "Oh, that's OK, sir, that's my job!" :ok:

Priceless...

overheard over frequency the other day:

xxx123 (british carrier) cleared direct to ERKIR, that's OERK'R in English

there was some laughter in the cockpit when readback was given.

Heard on France control today:-

XXX Proceed direct to Charlie Lima Mike

Pause

XXX Can you give me the lat/long for CLM?

Pause

XXX Make your heading 310 degrees!

Heard on MAN Approach yesterday morning "xxx123 737 with information victor, passing FL100 for FL80 and going like a train".

Well it made me chuckle anyway.

I did actually see the same when working GND at a Swedish air base.
Weather was CAVOK when the engineers arranged to start work on the approach lights. ......2 hrs later the fog moved in.

My slightly geriatric coworker on TWR turns the lights to 100% for a Gripen on PAR.

Que "KILL THE LIGHTS, FOR F**** SAKE KILL THE LIGHTS" (In swedish off course) in a high pitched voice on the vehicle UHF! :\ :\

Apparently 440 volts trough the spanner is not good! (The guy made it with only minor burns, thankfully) :E :E

Much more fun over a beer in the mess, then 5 minutes after it happened!

Heard on Tower Frequency today
 

EDI Tower

tower, "red arrows runway 2 4 wind 1 5 gusting 2 5 clear take off early left turn not above 1000 feet"
red arrows "roger clear take off runway 2 4"

tower "jersey xxx after the departing light aircraft on 2 4 line up and wait"
jerseyxxx (laughing) "after the departing light aircraft lining up rwy 2 4"

A few weeks ago I was on Lambourne bashing the stack down, holding was in the region of about 15 minutes. A Speedbird driver requested 1.5 minute legs which I approved.

When the time came to chuck him to Heathrow, without thinking I said-

"SpeedbirdXXX, report the length of your legs to Heathrow Director 119.725"

It took him a while to get the readback out whilst I sat there feeling like a numpty! :}

Some cheeky fella checked in shortly after with "ABC123 descending FL150, 32 inch inside leg":ok:

Heard few weeks ago:
ATC: "XXX123 descend FL200"
female voice (with really busy tone): "Two houndred, thank you, 123. But we really have to leave now??"
ATC: "As you prefere"
female: "Yes, thank you, in this case we are going to mantain a little bit more"
ATC: "Call me back leaving"
female: "As soon as I finish my tangerine, thank you"

few minutes later on next sector:

female: "Good afternoon from XXX123"
ATC: "123 good afternoon descend FL130 and if you've finished your tangerine you may proceed to ZZZ direct"
female: "Affirmative, FL130 direct ZZZ... practically seems that all the world has known the fact..."
ATC: "Eh, it could be expectable"
female: "that's ok, copied"

Four funny stories from Rhein Radar, Germany:

1. "Old" (I mean very experienced :ok:) military controller, to be pensioned a few months later working a civilian sector during low traffic. he decides to give a BA flight some unconventional traffic info about traffic blocking climb:

Rhein: "Speedbird 123, just for info, traffic is coming out of the sun, 4 miles out 1000ft high a Lufthansa A320."

Speedbird 123: "Roger, switching from missiles to guns!"

2. Probably works much better when actually hearing this :P
Rhein: "Turkish 123, contact München 133.755"

THY123: "Roger, contact Mission, 133.755" (at least it sounded like "misson")

A/C: "Houston Hallo, Lufthansa 152 Fl290"



3. Female trainee fighting hard during a departure rush, constantly transmitting.

Rhein: "Alitalia 123,.... ah disregard."

4 transmissons later

Rhein: "Alitalia 123,.... ah disregard."


another 6 transmissions later, again:

Rhein: "Alitalia 123,.... ah disregard."

AZA123 (male, heavy italian accent): "Ah, do you want my telephone number?"




4. This apparently happened long before I started my ATC carreer. It was the day a pope died (dunno which one.. guess it was late 70s, early 80s?). As the news spread in the ops room, one military controller tuned in the guard frequencies 243.0 and 121.5 and made the follwoing call:

"All stations, this is RheinRadar with a generall call. Use extreme caution, the pope is climbing through unrestricted!"

He got some problems after that :=

Now this is a good one!!!!
Does anybody has any more stuff like this?!?! It's really good.

One of the funniest I heard for real was when Jason turned the landrover on it's top into a (fortunately) dry creekbed at Holbeach: -

"Tower, Rover, Rovers over, Over".

When we stopped laughing we went and rescued him.

Great bloke

Doc C

Back in the olden days, before data transfers, "Radar 'andover, an Andover over Dover, over"

Try this forum over at LiveATC:
http://www.liveatc.net/forums/index.php?board=3.0

one I made
 

a very nervous first officer was just starting his first day at a commercial airline and he was posted with a captain of almost 40 years flying, as there flight was late on arrival to Newark Intl the captain being impatient made some risky maneuvers to gain some try get back on time and touched down just as ATC cleared him for finals, later this was noticed in the gripe sheet below some ordinary stuff
"whining noise in cockpit, suggest installing a set of balls to the first officer seat!"

cheers Hank:ok:

My contributions.

Heard on the Oslo 120.375. A N-reg 777 is about to get it's oceanic clearance or similar. Can't remember its callsign, but lets call it "american"
Oslo: "American 123, confirm you are RVSM approved?"
short pause
American: "yes ma'am"
Oslo: "American 123, confirm you are bla bla bla approved?"
slightly longer pause
American: "ah, yes ma'am, we are"
Oslo: "Ok American 123, confirm you are more bla bla bla approved?"
quite a long pause.
American (apparantly fed up with looking into what they are approved for and not): "Look ma'am, were a brand spankin' new 777 straight out of the factory, we're approved for everything!"

Heard during my initial training:
In Sweden the letters are pronounced as first names, much like M is Mike and J i Juliet. This goes for the whole alphabet. The student is only slightly aware of this and hasn't learnt the system quite yet. To translate the joke, lets say the callsign is MJ.
"XXXXXX Radio, Mike Johnsson, left downwind RWY 24".
Instructor looks puzzled at the studen and asks, "why did you say Johnsson? It should be juliet".
Student replies: "Well sir, I thought Mike should have a surname!"

Also during training:
TWR: "S-KS, extend downwind".
L-KS: "extending the runway, S-KS"

/LnS

Matrix2055 - thanks for that - it had me in stitches - absolutely hilarious....:D.

Strange...

http://www.constantcomedy.com/Video.aspx?id=59

May be a re-post....

But if we are giving video links for comedy attempts at ATC humour....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MeI154gaWL4

Notice how the real events are funny.. note to comedians: don't. :)

Female ATC: XXX123 have your clearance if your ready.

XXX123: Im always ready for you!

Female ATC: (spent the next few mins trying to pass clearnace while giggling!

Readbacks
 

ATC: "ABC Taxi to run-up bay report ready for further taxi."

ABC: "ABC"

ATC: "ABC Require read back."

ABC: "Taxi to run up bay, read back."

- I never thought I would hear it

Heard a few months back on APP.

ATC (female): xxx649 report ready for decent

xxx649: maam, we're ready to go down for you anytime.

Transavia 123: "Any chance for a short approach line-up?"

Schiphol APP: "No, I'm afraid you're number 4 in traffic"

Transavia 123: "Don't be afraid!"

Quite "busy" day at ARN.

SPANAIR 1106: "Request taxi"
ATC: "Spanair 1106 taxi to holding point 19L and say a number between 1 and 5"
Spanair: "Taxi to holding 19L and say again please"
ATC: "Say a number between 1 and 5"
Spanair: "Ehhh.... 3?"
ATC: "You are number 3 for departure."

You had to be there, however we have just witnessed a classic.
G-BVPR R22 on finals to woodvale..... Twr clears him to land, arrives ok. Twr then tells very nervous sounding solo pilot to taxi between two hangars. He can't grasp this instruction and wanders about for a couple of minutes, then gives up and lands on the grass. Twr says 'PR you have right of way to cross taxiway ahead of Tutor and Police helicopter and go to square of concrete between hangars'. He goes for our pad. Twr, NO! go between hangars!! Eventually he taxis to correct position after 6 minutes of being moved.
Then the call........ G-PR, I only wanted a touch and go!! :ok:

Heard on LPL tower today

ABC123: good afternoon ladies and gents welcome on board XXX to YYY, Im captain XXX, the First officer "brian" will shortly be calling the tower and asking for clearnace to push back from stand, in the mean time you'll be getting a safty brief from...went on like this for a few minutes.

once he had finished...

Tower: ABC123 is brian going to call us for clearnace to push back or not!

made me laugh. :ok:

i was doing night-vfr tcs around lowg yesterday in a c150
no other a/cs departing oder arriving till then, i was just climbing out of runway 17.
tower: OE-XXX
me: OXX, go ahead.
t: do you see the light in front of you
me: affirm
t: that is a airbus a120, so i would advise you to make a left turn soon.

was kinda funny at the moment :)

Funny true story rather than joke, heard at a fairly remote airport in 'North Britain'. They'd just got a brand spanking new tower, to replace the aged wartime one. When the old one was demolished Mr contractor had to take away its septic tank as well. Come the day when the concrete covers came off Mr c phones the management 'you'd better come and see this, it's full of johnnies'. Management 'mystified', but sporting knowing look as final piece of a jigsaw puzzle from many years before falls into place!

"Speedbird 253, 2 pieces of traffic twelve o'clock, 20 miles, 1000' above you air france Boeing 747, and 1000' below you Air France Airbus 340"

"Speedbird 253 roger, is that what you call a frog sandwich?"

------------------------------


ATC: "El Al 852 Contact Centre now 133.52, goodday"

SWR: "Roger Swiss niner echo going to 133.52 goodday

ATC: "Swiss call not for you"

SWR: "Oh Roger Sorry

*5 minutes later*

ATC:"Delta 187 contact centre 133.52"

SWR: "Roger Swiss niner echo going to 133.52 goodday this time!"

ATC: "Swiss, again, call not for you..."

SWR: "Oh.... Swiss niner echo roger I guess we just really want to leave you!"

ATC: "So did my last wife, but you can stay with me for a bit longer"

ATC, to a Shorts 360: "Command 187, can you make an intersection takeoff or do you have a full load in your Shorts?"

Just read in a German ATC forum:

Rhein: "DLH123, are you still looking for higher"
DLH123: "Affirm, loud and clear":)

At Copenhagen you can hear this quite often.

ATC: ABC123, you may save your breaks, rwy 22L cleared to land.

2 weeks ago, climbing out of Tirana/LATI:

TIA ATC: "LH1234, Belgrade request you squawk 4302"

we comply - 2 min later:

TIA ATC: "LH1234, Blegrade request you squawk 6020 now"

again we comply, but shortly after:

TIA ATC: "LH1234, please now squawk 6023"

About ten seconds pass:

TIA ATC: "It was Lady controler who told me that..."

We couldn't stop laughing for 10 minutes

Nic

women
 

This one has been told to me, wasn't there and don't know if it's true or not -but it's quite likely-. Happened something like 10-15 years back when the iron wall was still in place. A russian plane calling in, being identified and given some instructions by a female controller who is finishing the shift at the time-apparently there weren't that many back then and I guess specially @ other side of the "wall"-; so that was her last transmission for the day and a male colleague takes over. A couple of minutes later the pilot comes back:

"control, can you confirm we were cleared by a woman??"

makes me chuckle anyway

A.

Was fairly late in the evening at LL many years ago and only a couple of A/C on the GMC frequency:

GMC: "UALXXX give way to the Pakistan 747, you're then cleared in" (to the cul de sac)

UALXXX: " Roger, after the Pa*i"

There then followed a pause to which the Pakistan replied " We're not moving until we get an apology!"

UALXXX: In a very confused voice " Err.. Have we offended you sir? Well, we're sorry"

The UAL had obviously just abbreviated the C/S and had no idea what he had said!

The Pakistan pilot was obviously very upset as he then crossed a Red stop bar, and then proceeded to cross an active runway ending up in T4 for a departure off 27R!!

Last night on twr.
Comair xxx are you ready to line up.
Negative. I'm waiting for a sterile Captain

Funny at the time

New to this site
 

I just finished reading throught the 49 pages to make sure I would not repeat...

True story from where I work a few years ago

To a South Eastern Delta feeder (bible belt):
CLX: AAA1234 cleared to ATL .... squawk 0666...
A/C: AAA1234 cannot accept this sqawk
CLX: roger, switch to ground who will give you your code
CLX gets a new code from flight planning and gives the story to GND with a suggestion for a joke
GND: AAA1234 I have your new squawk code
A/C: ready to copy
GND: it's 1313
long pause
CLX to GND: better give it the real one before they leave the plane
GND: seriously, it's 1234
A/C: we're happy it's a joke

I will add on a regular basis stories that happened to me or my collegues... if they are deemed funny:rolleyes:

This morning...
Scandinavian123 winds 370 at 10 knots cleared to land, 30R.
Good it was only in the simulator room, but even we at the other end on another sim of the room laughed!

Overheard on finals on an extremely stable day , having had the same high pressure area over Europe for two weeks *i.e. not O-N-E knot of wind* Munich tower goes:

TWR " LH1234 , what's the wind at 3000'?"
LH 1234 : " *Sigh*....it's two-six-zero diagonal........two"
Some time later on the apch " LH1234 , what's the wind at 1000'?"
LH1234 " Zero.Diagonal zero"

I guess this guy wasn't German.

Last resort heading
 

On a windy day from the NW.
Late afternoon rush as the sun is setting to the West.
Single runway ops on 32: light GA mixed with commercial.
A DV20 coming back to land.
TWR is trying to squeeze him between arrivals and departures.

1st try: tower gives him his sequence to turn base, he turns too late, comes close to airliner, twr takes him out of there.

2nd try: twr uses headings to point him in the opening, DV20 succeeds at messing the plan and misses another airliner.

There is still a line up of departures and arrivals.

TWR: GABC do you see the sun?
ABC: uh... yes tower
TWR: fly towards it I'll call you back

Guess what?
It worked!:ok:


In the same line:

To an aircraft that does not follow any instructions and uses bad RT

TWR: ABC do you have enough fuel to leave my zone?:E