I'm an ex Merchant Navy officer and now a Marine Surveyor. Was also lucky enought at the tender age of 10 to be at Cape Canaveral to see the Mariner 9 Mars probe launched. Hence the name.

Yep....still a chick ;)

Names, names!
 

What a splendid array of monikers! Thanks, every one for your imaginative titles and the reasons why....

People who are required to learn English may be puzzled by some nicknames. It took me quite a while to figure out Dan Winterland, Lou Scannon, Pete O'Tube, Art E. Fischler-Reisen. Some, alas, are bordering on the scatological (what else do you expect from a bunch of pilots?) Hugh Jarse almost looks respectable. bumitch? perhaps talcum powder might help...

Will Hung and Seymour Beaver obviously hope to impress....while monocock - with reference of course to the construction of certain aircraft (took me a while to get that one - being misled by his explanation. I've never yet heard of a gentleman with two of those items.)

Genghis the Engineer refers to his illustrious ancestor - who may well be actually his ancestor, because the DNA of Genghis Kahn is found in more than 30% of the population of Asia - and Europe!

but I0540 does not need to be concerned about the German chap Norbert W*nk who moved to the United States. Americans are not acquainted with the term.

Or this Canadian either. But then I accept that the people of the UK will continue to think up new words and acronyms, to confuse those of us on the left side of the Atlantic!

Not to mention those to the right (!) side of their splendid isolation.

I never worked out Dan Winterland... but then I am not English. Could somebody explain, please?

Groan: OK Here goes:

Downwind to land..

Geddit now?

Not really......... :hmm:

R/T call one might make when one is flying one's flying machine along the downwind leg of the circuit of an airfield with a view, after the base leg and final leg have been completed , to placing said flying machine safely upon the ground.

A term we British call 'landing'.

So it's a kinda aviation linked 'silly name'

Bliddy furriners............

I'm going to lie down now............

That one got me too, until the explanation in post #129 and even then it took a moment to twig that one needed to say it out loud and in a Cockney accent! As for me, well Amateur Radio being one of my hobbies and that flying was to do with being elevated above the ground - aerial. Aerial was taken when I first registered so Aerials it was!

Quote:
Americans are not acquainted with the term.
Many moons ago, when I was a space cadet, I was told that the term "w*nker" is derived from "winger" which was a derogatory term applied to a wing man who didn't hold his position relative to his number 1 when flying in combat, during WW II.

Anyone else heard that? :confused:

Dingbat because it's completely unrelated to my name. But it was taken so I added my initial. It vaguely reminds me of 'I Robot' but mostly I wish I'd thought up something better :\

Oh thank God, someone explained it! Cusco you must work as some form of intelligence analyst! At least part-time?


The500Man's story: Triple-edited-clean-version

At university I knew a girl that I once had to remind that I was the man. later, I was signing up for an internet account somewhere requiring an anonymous screen name and I thought long and hard for 2 seconds and then typed in theman. It was taken! I wasn't going to be theman 1,2,....73 etc. So I applied a significant number instead. 500 relates to a famous motor racing event.

From that day forth I was the500man, except on Youtube where I can confirm the500man is in fact an imposter! (Don't ask what I use over there! :mad:)

I seem to be some sort of cryptic enigma!

Me: ''CWL70, down wind to land".

Tower: "CWL70, Roger. Call Finals".

Me: (About a minute later). "CWL70, finals - gear down".

Tower: ''CWL70, clear land".

Me: "Clear land, CWL70".




Not so difficult to understand. I even used my real personal callsign from a few years back.

The other side of the coin is that you can see things in names which are not there.

When I started on helicopters, I lurked in Rotorheads and I saw somebody post that Shawn Coyle had a good handle. I had actually convinced myself that it stood for:
"Sure, and see O'Wiley"
(best done in an Irish accent), before I realised that he is the author of an extremely good book on helicopters ("Cyclic and Collective").

The other side of the coin is that you can see things in names which are not there.

True indeed - but as long as it only happens onto you in names, you stand a fair chance of safe landings.

C-dog

Bit obvious really.

Many other mariners out there?

FlexGate

It is a thrust detent used primarily for a de-rated take off under a pre-calculated temperature through the FMGS of a modern Airbus aircraft.

I posted on the topic in the rotorheads forum. Like I said then, all the good names were taken. IFMU stands for In-Flight Management Unit. I wrote autopilot software on it for a rotary wing unmanned vehicle.

-- IFMU

ps a quick internet search seems to suggest that it now stands for "Internet F***** Me Up. Well, as Ray Bradbury said, computers have done nothing to improve the lot of mankid.

When I joined Pprune I had a Piper Cub. It had nose bleeds if it went above 1,000 feet and it wasn't fast.
Low 'n Slow was already taken so I joined it all up but people occasionally got us confused especially in the glory days of Pprune Chat.