Callsigns

[justapax]

Every aircraft has a callsign painted on its side. Every amateur radio station has a callsign. So do ship's radio operators. The difference is that ships have run-on callsigns e.g., C5GN, aircraft have a dash e.g. G-BOAC, and amateurs have a number, mine is G8SHE. Usually the letters at the front mean your nation, and are the same under all three schemes, but not always, OO- is for Belgian planes, ON is for Belgian amateurs. This dates back to the days of morse code and the nineteen twenties, when an amateur radio morse transmission might be confused with a communication with an aircraft.

These callsigns allocations go back to the earliest days of radio communication, so the US has W, A, N, K, and the British Empire had G, 2, M, V and Z. As nations have become independent, they have chosen new callsigns, but some of the Empire callsigns still persist, India is VT and VU, Australia is VK, Canada is VE and VA, South Africa is ZS, New Zealand is ZL.

If you see a plane at White Waltham with a M- registration, that's Isle of Man, It's another example of where amateur and aircraft callsigns are now different - the G(number)three letters has run out of callsigns for amateurs, so M(number)three letters means England. GD(number)three letters means Isle of Man.

You'd be surprised how emotional nations get about their callsigns. Most post-colonial nations chose different callsigns, e.g, 4X and 4Z for Israel. Two letters and numbers (never more than two) mean a lot to emergent nations.

[Hydromet]

it's said that Papua New Guinea's aircraft registration prefix, P2, was chosen because most people just refer to New Guinea, and they wanted to include Papua too.

[treadigraph]

Originally Posted by justapax

. Two letters and numbers (never more than two)

Exceptions are A4O- Oman, A9C- Bahrain, RDPL- Laos and 9XR- Rwanda...

[justapax]

Originally Posted by treadigraph

Exceptions are A4O- Oman, A9C- Bahrain, RDPL- Laos and 9XR- Rwanda...

That's just Lao being awkward. The prefix for Lao is XW, but they paint something different on the side of their planes, as the Soviet Union did, they painted CCCP-(number) on their planes. The other three have normal two-cypher registrations, but only use one letter or number of the suffix, as does Cyprus, 5B, but 5B4 is the only prefix used (The colonial prefix was ZC4, which is still used by the British Sovereign Base Areas). Another exception is HB=Switzerland on planes, but HB9=Switzerland for radio amateurs, HB0=Liechtenstein. As there isn't enough flat land to make a runway on in Liechtenstein, no aircraft are registered to Liechtenstein. I understand the prince has a heliport, I don't know what his helicopters are registered to.

[redsnail]

I always thought that the numbers and letters (country dependent) was the aircraft registration marks (aka tail number). They can be used as a callsign but in most commercial operations, they are not.
Eg I used to fly (amongst many others) CS-CHA. That's the registration, however, our flight number could be NJE8HD or if there was a regulation, NJE345X. The flight number changed if there was a regulation, if not, it would revert to the NJE8HD which was unique to that tail number.
The callsign? That would be "Fraction 8 hotel delta" or "Fraction 345 x-ray".

[justapax]

As I understand it, planes still have tail numbers, but for ATC purposes it's the airline designator (e.g., 'speedbird' for British Airways) followed by the flight number. What purpose do tail numbers still serve, apart from entertaining planespotters?

Old documentaries of Croydon aeroport and early London Aeroport (Heathrow) have ATC talking to planes using their tail numbers.

[treadigraph]

It's a unique and simple registration (or serial number if military I think) rather than a tail number and serves to identify a particular airframe when on the official books of a particular country. Like car registrations.

Aircraft construction numbers (Manufacturer's Serial Number) are often not unique, eg 10345 on RZJets turns up four airframes, F-27, DC-4, A321 and a CRJ. Probably plenty of others not listed on their DB.

Incidentally, I'd forgotten about the Soviet-era CCCP - which when westernised should read SSSR-. Good job they didn't choose a Socialist nomenclature made up of some other Cyrillic letters, might have proved a challenge for plane spotters using typewriters and so on to log their sightings in the days of yore (I used small Index Cards and a typewriter a friend gave me...)

[DaveReidUK]

Originally Posted by treadigraph

Aircraft construction numbers (Manufacturer's Serial Number) are often not unique, eg 10345 on RZJets turns up four airframes, F-27, DC-4, A321 and a CRJ. Probably plenty of others not listed on their DB.

Interestingly, different manufacturers take different approaches to dreaming up serial numbers. For example Airbus have a separate sequence for each family, so while you won't find, say, an A319 and A321 with the same MSN, you may well find an A320 and A330 with identical serial numbers.

Boeing, on the other hand, have never built any two jetliners with the same MSN, although even for the same type numbers jump all over the place.

Douglas traditionally had a similar system to Boeing, although they did famously manage to build two largish batches of DC-3's (in separate factories) which inadvertently were given the same MSNs.

[treadigraph]

I was nosing round the late Joe Baugher's site and realised that USAF/US Army serial sometimes now reflect the manufacturer's MSN or line number; eg: CH-47F 15-08462 is MSN M8462 and C-130J 14-5810 is MSN 5810. It seems the days of giving the next batch of airframes ordered serial numbers consecutive to the previous batch of a different type ordered under the fiscal year are gone.

MoD seem to allocate batches all over the shop in the latter Z* sequence, again it used to be a fairly orderly transition from say XZ100 to XZ999 then ZA100 to ZA999, etc, now one type might be ZZ***, the next ZM*** - or so it seems. Confoosed...

[DaveReidUK]

Originally Posted by treadigraph

MoD seem to allocate batches all over the shop in the latter Z* sequence, again it used to be a fairly orderly transition from say XZ100 to XZ999 then ZA100 to ZA999, etc, now one type might be ZZ***, the next ZM*** - or so it seems. Confoosed...

The rot truly set in when the MoD started inventing serial numbers where the first (or first two) of the three digits was/were zero, rather than the usual 100-999 sequence.

I can't remember what type that happened with, but I know they did it with the Watchkeepers which (even worse) were shoehorned into the WKnnn sequence, last used for Venoms, Chipmunks and Meteors.

I very nearly wrote a letter to The Times.

[treadigraph]

Seems to have been ZH Defenders and ZK Merlins and Hawks... https://www.ukserials.com/

(And then there was ZK009-01 MiTex Buster 1-1000 and its stablemates ZK009-02, ZK009-03 and ZK009-04. Whatever a Mitex Buster is. Sounds like a vacuum cleaner.)

To drag this back to callsigns, of course Galaxies and Starlifters used to call their serial, say "MAC 60144" would be Starlifter 66-0144... unless it had gone tech after the paperwork had been submitted or so it's been said. So how many of these aircraft whose serials I duly noted after naughtily listening to 134.9 on my airband were actually wrong? I did change the sightings if ever I caught up with one on the ground at Mildenhall or Greenham Common but my old log is still littered with PUR (Purley) or WIT (Witley, where I was at skool) and probably other places where I logged them - never did see a C-141 on the ground at Gatwick, but potted the odd one sailing down Green One to Dover!

[cavuman1]

The 1977 Cessna 152 in which I trained and soloed was N757WW. She was known in Savannah/Hunter, St. Simons Island, and Jacksonville Center as "Double Shot!" (Get it? Whiskey Whiskey!)

- Ed

[pax britanica]

Are most of these not strictly call signs-certainly in the airline world its almost always the airline and flight number - a pain back in my spotting days when you couldnt get the registration over the air

[justapax]

The USA and Japan don't follow the rest of the world, the callsign isn't N-(four letters) or J- four letters. it's just N or J, no dash, letters and numbers. At the White Waltham Bash I saw a light aircraft with an N-reg, it must have flown US-Goose-Gander - Nuuk -Keflavik-some place in Scotland. I understand ferry pilots do this route routinely. As I only fly hang-gliders, and not over water, this seems slightly awesome to me.

[treadigraph]

A large number of UK and European-owned aircraft are American registered under blanket corporations for various cost/certification reasons I know not particularly wot of; it's been the case for a long time (I recall three at Biggin Hill on my first visit in the mid-1970s) though many more have been apparent in the last decade or three. The Fighter Collection's American aircraft were US registered for a long time, the P-51D Moose arrived in 1980, the Bearcat in 1981, plus several others and they transferred to the UK register in the late 1990s. Probably most of the pilots flying them did so on FAA licences. Looking at the ADSB playback from early today, I quickly picked out five US-registered light aircraft airborne, a Commander 114, a Twin Com and three Cirruses.

That said, quite a number of singles do make the Atlantic crossing each year and, inevitably, the odd one is lost; sadly a C182 crashed fatally in Greenland last month, as discussed in the accident forum. The American lady owners of a beautiful Stinson I once flew in were lost while flying their Aero Commander trans-Atlantic some years back. A lovely Cessna 185 I noticed overnighting on the Narsarsuaq webcam in August also suffered a fatal landing accident when it arrived back in the US, a sad end to an epic and doubtless quite tiring journey.

[pax britanica]

Despite all the evident dangers and high accident rate (relative to other aviation ops) wasnt there some scandal some years ago about someone ferrying aircraft they were not quaified to or breaking down in Greenland needing money for spares . I would ahve though there were less risky crimes for those of the criminal persuasion . Not something to under take lightly ocean crossings in light aircraft is it

[treadigraph]

Indeed - there was quite a thread on here about the ferry flight antics of RW. I recall amongst other things that his web site claimed he'd recently given Brendan O'Brien a biennial; I mentioned on the PPRuNe thread that I know Brendan slightly (true) and would enquire next time I saw him how his biennial had gone - strangely the claim disappeared overnight! The vexed issue of the PA-34 parked on relatively unhospitable land somewhere down the famous fjord that leads to Narsarsuaq and eventually helicoptered out if I recall... I think his was a case of ambition exceeding competence and those who had generously nurtured his flying enthusiasm as a teenager tried to temper his fervour and got short thrift in return. Wonder what he is up to now?

[DaveReidUK]

Originally Posted by justapax

The USA and Japan don't follow the rest of the world, the callsign isn't N-(four letters) or J- four letters. it's just N or J, no dash, letters and numbers.

Add South Korea (HL) to that list. Japan is JA.

[longer ron]

Originally Posted by justapax

As I understand it, planes still have tail numbers, but for ATC purposes it's the airline designator (e.g., 'speedbird' for British Airways) followed by the flight number. What purpose do tail numbers still serve, apart from entertaining planespotters?
.

Why have tail numbers ?
Well it is quite handy for pilots/crews and techies to know which is the correct A/C to board/walkround/service so external registration letters/numbers are very handy for that - especially if you have a long line of almost identical aircraft to choose from,even then mistakes have previously been made

[pax britanica]

Dont they usually also put an abbreviated version on the nose gear doors . And the tail 'numbers' G-BOAC , N1234 , A4E-EK style are surely part of the formal registration process of the aircraft, country of registration and ownership. Another example is Bermuda VP-B which despite being one of the smallest countries in the world ( 23 Sq Miles is the worlds largest offshore registry for airline and private aircraft . So the 'tail number still has an important place