Back in '06 I think at SY 16R, I was on about a 3 mile final......

' K****n *** clear for take off '
' Clear for take off K****n *** '

' K****n *** airborne '

' K****n *** well done!!! '

Try raising the gear, retracting the flap and starting the 2nd engine :ok:

A long time ago….on night shift, solo tower controller advises an aircraft to report at 5 miles, then promptly falls asleep. Awakes a little while later and assumes aircraft must be close to reporting.

Twr: “XXX, clear to land”

XXX: “If you don’t mind tower we’ll do a 180 and taxi back….”

Hear the full story told by the controller at:

similar solo twr one, late at night. Approaching a/c gets no response to multiple inbound calls and landing info. As he get closer, still no reponse, so he puts the landing lights on aims the aircraft at the twr and waggles the rudder, then tries flashing the lights on an off. Still no answer.
Maybe the guys died at the desk..??
So he lands, taxis in, parks and ties down. Gathers his kit and walks to the twr and up the stairs. There's a newspaper over the console and, he's not dead, but fast asleep.

So he shouted in this ear "ABC, On the ground at XXX, Cancelling SAR"
That got his attention.!

Heard a very similar story to that last one, however the pilot / aircraft was not at the airport they thought they were!

Many Years ago At NZWP a VFR Dominie Call while I was a Bit Busy.I told Him to Stand by.
About 20 min Later the dominie Called up:
"This is 662 standing by:
Around the aerodrome I do fly, I have enough fuel for about an Hour and the I will be without Power."

He was cleared to land immediately!
Gulfairs

What a ripper thread. Have more than a few similar tales ... which, at my age, I won't relate as I don't need the embarrassment any more ... however ..

And my own personal favourite, since returning to Australia to fly....... At 6000' on a downwind for 34R, abeam the runway.
SYD ATC: "You have 22 track miles to run. descend 4000."
(Get ready lads, I'm going to turn you in for a 5 mile final and take bets on whether you can do it)

Many years ago on the Electra, we were motoring up from LST to SYD late one night at FL300. Bored out of our brains, a bet was taken that one should delay descent (for a displaced noise abatement threshold to the south) until abeam the airfield. The ATC-ers were getting quite agitated as each descent clearance, in turn, was acknowledged .. but not actioned. Still had to put some power on to make the runway ... the Goose was a flexible ship ...

A similar tale, some years later, on the B733. DRW to CNS, westerly wind, expected to be as rough as guts at Cairns .. over the northern threshold at 10000 ft and a very relaxed descending circuit to land into the north. Great fun.

Maybe the guys died at the desk..?? So he lands, taxis in, parks and ties down. Gathers his kit and walks to the twr and up the stairs. There's a newspaper over the console and, he's not dead, but fast asleep.

And, for the complementary situation .. many, many years ago (pre-radar), a fine pair of lads in a Gooney were motoring up from LST to EN .. very late, one night. As rarely happens to (other) freighter pilots, they both nodded off. Eventually, one of them woke up .. quite some many miles north of Melbourne. A quick call to the ATC-er ... some waffle about unforecast stronger winds, quick 180, back down south of Melbourne, quick 180 .. and the flight ended up none the worse for wear at Essendon. Taxying in, the ATC-er asked if the captain might drop in at the tower for a natter. Duly presented himself (perhaps a little apprehensive ?) only to have the ATC-er confide "Jeez, mate, I missed a couple of your calls .. I was sound asleep ... OK if we just write this one off to experience ?" "Not a problem, mate, all's well". Life was a lot more relaxed and fun back in the olden days. And the captain stills flies ... now at a quite respectable age .. one of the Industry's greater legends and all round top bloke.

"...Standby, I'll recycle the transponder"
("I completely forgot to turn the Transponder on")

"...That light was working before I left..."
("I was not going to delay this flight because of one bulb blown")

Some Survey goodness!

"Center, weather is no good for the job, request return to field"
("Sensor has **** itself yet again")

"Need a few orbits to calibrate the sensor first"
("Sensor has **** itself yet again")

"Center, Ops Normal, turning onto line 52")
("Sensor has **** itself yet again, but we'll keep going cause we just got here, it took a lot of effort to get this clearance and we don't want you to think we're idiots")

"Clearance for your Survey job is not available due traffic today"
("You did nothing but orbits and delay yesterday, probably cause your Sensor **** itself yet again, I can't be bothered dealing with you today!")

"You can start up and call for clearance and we might be able to squeeze you in"
("Getting sick of you calling us everyday for this BS job, going to do my best to squeeze you in and get rid of you!")

"Got your maps here, not exactly the best time or place to try and do Survey..."
("HAHAHAHAHA, you idiots want to do survey where and when?!")

Been said before but still one of my favourites
"Weather was just above minimas but closing in, probably no good now"
("Holy ****, how did I make it through that?!")

The old Coffs FSU used to be home to two one-off characters (JR and SS) . JR once repeatedly ignored a local pilot's many calls requesting "radio check . .. how do you read?" Some time later this driver-airframe was up in the office where JR was still on the job. "By the way" , he said to JR ", did you hear me asking you this morning for a radio check?" "Yeah mate. You were two by two ." "Well that's a load of codswallop." "I'm telling you, you were 2 by 2 - too loud and too often."

As for old SS, he wasn't nick-named Slack Stan for nothing, as he came across as casual and laid-back, but truth was this demeanor hid a sharp mind and a man good at his job. In their rest room there were some of the old steel lockers marked C of A (Commonwealth of Australia) , one of which had dymoed on it ESSENTIAL USE ONLY. The locker next to it was Stan's. He had dymoed on it SENSUAL USE ONLY.

Then there was the croppy taxying Wagga late one afternoon "Wagga - ABC taxying Wagga for Hay" "G'day Fred. Hope you make Hay while the sun shines."

This one got a mention on the back page of the afore-mentioned AUSTRALIAN AVIATION when Jim Thorne ran it. It concerned a pilot with a pronounced stammer. There was only one HF frequency workable , and that with difficulty. Ch..Ch..Chris was trying to make an ops normal call , but the Sydney FSU and the Lord Howe FSU (calling each other) were making it hard for anyone else to be heard. Finally Chris managed to get a word in edgeways - "L...Lord Howe I wish y..y..you'd sh .. . shut up!"

KLM pilot on being advised he was a little left on the localiser (thick Dutch accent - ) "Yes... that is correct. And my first officer is a little to the right of it."

No mention was made about altitude or turbocharging regarding the Cessna 310. 2 Dogs did say IAS. What IAS do you think you would see at say FL120 in a normally aspirated 310 ?

Italian ATC:

- Coordination in progress(piss off, do not want to give you any "service" at all)

- Unable to approve(see above....)

- unable to give higher cruise level - your Flightplan says FLxxx (see above, lol). Very trendy with Brindisi at the moment even with no traffic around at all. Like a bloody automatically filed Lido FPL really is considering actual FL requirements.

- for this request contact next sector(Roma,Milano, Padua, .....brrrr Brindisi) (which means exactly the same as all above)

- unable to change routing as you are close to contact Zagreb(because the idiotic Lido was filing a FPL from Bergamo to Bari VIA Zagreb airspace(shake head in resignation) and any attempt to organize a much much much shorter routing with Padua(for 20 minutes) fails on the unability of Padua and Brindisi to organize that request which was put forward on EVERY frequency change. Yep - Italian ATC. Part of the Bermuda triangle of ATC (together with France and Spain) here in Europe. Ali and Italian ATC team up very well.

If you hear above phrases the 100th times it stops to be funny.

Ahhhh, and I forgot the "magic" "Franco" on 121.500 ..... Italian speciality and I am quiet sure some boy captains of a famous low cost throw that one out all the time. So bad that sometimes you have to shut down 121,5 (against sop) as this morons interfere with parallel ATC calls more then once.
La dolce vita.........(as long as you don't need to fly there, or drive, or anything else..... :suspect:)

ATC: Please advise time required for run-ups
(Get your sh!t together if you don't want to sit at holding for hours).

ATC: I have a window of opportunity - can you make X (reporting point) at Y (time).
(Get your sh!t together if you don't want to orbit for hours).

ATC: Heavy, reduce speed to X to allow for traffic landing on crossing runway.
(Give us a second while I see if Top Gun here can actually do a short field landing or will require the full 1800m in a lighty...again).

ATC: Confirm if visual?
Aircraft: Confirm visual - we found a hole.
ATC: (yeah, right. And I still believe in the Tooth Fairy...)

ATC: Hold at X (feature) until further advised.
(Don't get smart with me, Numpty!)

ATC: In with a ground station, say again?
(I was giving a heads up to the next sector about how much of a Numpty you really are, and wondering how in God's sweet name you actually managed to qualify for a licence of any description.)

ATC: Contact 1234 5678 after shutting down.
(Boy, get your wellies. You are in deep sh!t)

ATC: Aircraft X miles South of Y, you have traffic ahead, same altitude, in your 12 o'clock. Currently 7 miles and closing.
(Get your head out of the cockpit and pay attention!)
No response.
ATC: Second Aircraft X miles South of Y, you also have traffic ahead, same altitude in your 12 o'clock. Currently 6 miles and closing.
(FFS, I hope one of you is on this frequency and paying attention.)

ATC: I say again, XYZ, the cloud base is 800 feet, reducing in showers. Showers in area.
(You're VFR, FFS, and on a training solo, do you seriously want to do this?)

Aircraft: ATC, confirm (Aircraft) is to follow traffic currently in my 5 o'clock.
(Are you for real, dude?)
ATC: Aircraft, Affirmative. Follow the (Type) currently in your 5 o'clock.
(Yup. You pIssed me off once too often last week.)

ATC: Be aware that the SIDS departure procedure is (Reads out full SIDS departure procedure).
(Learn to read, shi!t-for-brains, then learn to fly.)

And a couple of my personal favourites:

NotATart: ATC, request 5 miles right of track.
ATC: Due weather?
(WTF? Its CAVOK)
NotATart: Affirmative.
Couple of minutes later.
NotATart: ATC, ready to resume track.
ATC: Confirm clear of weather?
(WTF are you up to?)
NotATart: Affirmative. The FO just wanted to take a pic of his mum's house.

ATC: Redroo, can you make X (position) at Y (time)?
Redroo: I will give her a fair ole kick in the guts, but I reckon we should be able to make that...

one more.......

Chopperdude (training) with multiple requests to climb, descend, hover, taxi-hover, all in a confined area of the airport, all during the lunchtime rush hour....
ATC: XYZ Chopperdude, you are cleared to climb, descend and hover. Just stay below 500 feet, and stay over the grass. Repeat - you are to stay below 500 feet, and STAY OVER THE GRASS.

Flywatcher, was that one particularly well known Tower guy at Launy who is close to or has just recently retired? Made calls like this a lot and was an absolute pleasure to deal with, if I knew him I'd definitely have to go buy him a beer!!

The biggest lie of all:

"No delay"

everyone knows - ATC - higher flight levels not available. PLANE - why so? ATC - noise abatement . PLANE - Really? ATC - If you bang into opposite direction traffic it will be very noisy.

remember the ATC chap giving an after lunch speech? - British ATC southern sector, handing over to the French controller -

Brit ATC - Pierre I have five for you
French ATC - I reject them.

Brit ATC - Why ?
Frech - Today we are on strike.