pilots' jargon and slang
 

I am a translator/interpreter at the Moscow-based Russian branch of Boeing and I am really eager to learn western pilots' talk, slang, jargon and stuff. I would really appreciate if you guys could dump in this thread some of your slanguage and sayings with a brief explanation of what they mean. I guess such thread could also be helpful as a pilots' talk glossary for the newbies.

Here's a bunch of examples of what I mean by slang:

George, to command George = autopilot

ETOPS =
In the cargo world, it stands for "Engines Turn Or Packages Sink".
In the airline world, it is: "Engines Turn Or People Swim."

Slam Dunk = Tactical Descent (steeper than normal visual approach)

"Keep your Engineer Wife, your First Officer house and your Captain's paycheck” (sayings like that also count as "slang")

Boredom Tube - slang synonym for a plane


Thanx everybody in advance

What? I'm confused...

Also a bit confused about the question.:confused:

Once heard a sabena pilot say, We'll shoot the ILS - meaning go down the ILS.

Heard it said again years later.

I am confused what's so confusing about my question folks :)
Do you mean to say that there's no such thing as pilots' slang and jargon? IT folks have their jargon, navy folks have their jargon, any professional community has a jargon - some insider language, which can hardly be 'decoded" by a person from the outside. Will non-aviation folks understand what is "to throw gear" (be a copilot) or "to command George" without explanation. I am not talking formalized tech terms like "stabilizer trim" or "pressure relief valve" which cannot be understood by an outsider either but they can be easily looked up in a dictionary or a reference book. But stuff like "dive and drive" or "steam gauge plane" or "slow, low and dirty" is not in the dictionary. This is pro talk.
Do pilots always use official, formalized words when they talk about aviation stuff in informal settings like in a bar or on a message board like this?

We call it 'Banter' over here old chap. The following training video should hopefully explain all...............


YouTube - Monty Python RAF Banter

Hope this helps:}

V Nice :)

How about a list of TLA's???
 

"There I was on my last LPC/OPC and the TRE gave us a NDB/DME APP instead of the usual ILS followed by a G/A and standard MAP due to ATC advising of FOD on the RWY."

Or something like that

ETOPS=Extended Twin Engine Operational Performance Standards

XOLODENKO - Sorry, but there is very little slang used in the professional civil aviation world as we are required to apply ICAO standard phraseology to our communications and this tends to carry over to our general discussions about aviation related matters and company SOPs require it on the flight deck. Sid Starz post shows the extent to which acronyms become common place and confuse everyone!

Most of the examples you have posted don't really exist in real aviation, apart from 'hot and high' meaning higher than the optimum profile and faster as well, or an airfield, like Mexico City in summer, that will be at least +30C and is over 5000' Above mean sea level. "Low and Slow" could suggest an aircraft in a landing configuration.
If you want to make a genuine impression you will do far better by learning the proper names for systems, procedures and situations etc. etc. people will know you have researched and are serious.

The last time I heard the auto-pilot referred to as "George" was on a cheaply made black and white film about fifty years ago!

How about this....?
 

Newlywed couple.

Wife takes Cabin staff position with airline.

Few months later, the somewhat jealous husband asks wife "Honey, you haven't been spending time with those pilots have you?"

She answers "Negative."



.......sorry, somewhat silly, but just came to mind.

Well, as you sit in your Scarebus,fat dumb and happy, thumb up bum,in 8/8ths severe clear-you better hope it doesn't all go Tango-Uniform and put you in the Cumulo Granite! Tea and bikies minus the Jaffa Cakes!

Nice one Homer :ok:

Thanx for everybody's feedback guys!

K.Whyjelly, thanx for giving me the right word for how you refer to pilots' slang. I will make sure I'll use this one next time I post a thread with a question about slang on an aviation forum (I aroused similar confusion over my question when I posted a thread like this on Airline Pilot Central Forum, so I think if I had written "banter" everyone would've understood what I was after).

SNS3Guppy, I know the official meaning of ETOPS, sir, and I am more interested in unofficial ones:) like the ones I listed in my examples.

parabellum, thanx for your elaborate reply. I am fully aware that slang is not allowed in ops situations and must be invariably avoided. What I was asking for are the words you use when you chat with other pilots in non-ops situation like on a message board like that or in a pub or in a hotel room. But since you've mentioned that you pretty much use the same standard and official terms in non-ops situations as you use in ops, now I realize that the share of "banter" in the entire pilots' vocabulary is not that significant as I thought it was and there's little reason to explore this any further.

I've actually come across the examples I've listed while surfing thru the aforementioned US pilots' forum so I dare to assert they are not as nonexistent as you said they were:)

Me being an interpreter, my interest in "banter" is purely linguistic, not practical and I am collecting such words not to make an impression (since I can't think of a situation in my job where I could make use of them and even if there was one I would not use them coz folks for whom I usually interpret are not pilots and they will never understand those)

HOMER SIMPSONS LOVECHILD, could you please "decode" that one for me for errh...merely linguistic purposes?:)I can understand some bits like "Scarebus", "fat dumb and happy" and....well.. "severe clear" is something about clouds...that's about all I can decode ^)

737
 

Years back I heard these when referring to the 737:

SLUF - Slow Little Ugly F....r (and it appears, after reading some other threads, now folks are descending at 250kts, so pretty close to home)

FLUF - Fat Little Ugly F.....r

Presently (Scare)Bus guy, but still, Boeing and/or 'Douglas' rule............

Here's a few sayings/slang/non standard phraseology:

Dangle the Dunlops- put the gear down.
Engauge cruise control- engauge the autopilot.
Motion coming on- said when disengauging the autopilot.

SNAFU
 

Situation normal, all f****d up,

or FUBAR, F****d up beyond all recognition.

Normal response to the new roster ;-)

Engine maker
 

GE - Good Engine

PW - Power wasted

RR - Rotating Rubbish

slowto280, here's the full list of aircraft nicknames, sir:):

A10: Warthog
A318: Nanobus
A319: Microbus
A320: MiniBus, NintendoJet, ScareBus, Chainsaw, Deathjet, Freddie Kruegers wet dream, Toulouse Grasscutter, The Strimmer
(What's the difference between an A320 and a beaver? 4000 trees per hour.)
A320 is known as 'The John Wayne' Because they 'Chop down trees, move mountains and kill Indians!!'
A380: Double Decker Bus, Megabus
Alouette: Chicken chaser
AT6 Harvard: Halfard.
Avro Shackleton: Shacklecaster, 10,000 rivets in close formation, flying Cow, Old Grey Lady
Avro Vulcan: Tin triangle
AW62 Argosy: Whistling Wheelbarrow, Whistling Tit
BAC 111:Pocket rocket.
BAe146: Viscount 900, Smurfjet with 5 APU's, The Gas Chamber, Bumble-et, Baby Jumbo, Bring Another Engine, 1-4-Sick, submarine- low slow and out of sight, Airborne Auschwitz, Tonka Toy, 4 oil leaks connected by an electrical fault, The Quadra-Puff, Lead Sled, Mini Galaxy, Sky Dozer, Fisher Price 747, "1 aeroplane, 4 engines, needs 6", The Slug, Toxic Terror, Muffler (Because all the noise is on the inside), Fruit Bat, Flying cockroach.
BAe ATP: Advanced/Another Technical Problem, The Parrot (cos it's just a big Budgie), Ancient Technology Perpetuated, Bat Pee, Skoda, 80p, Wigwam (A TeePee).
BAe Harrier: Leaping Heap
BAe Jetstream: Junkstream, Wetdream, Soda-stream.
BAe Nimrod: Never Intended for Maritime Reconnaissance Or Development.
Bristol Beaufighter: Whispering Death
Beech 18: Flying snag
Beech 99: 99-Liner
Beech Baron: Ball tearer
Beech Bonanza: Doctor killer (its reputation as such is ubiquitous)
Beech 200: Super K
Beech 1900: Flipper, Dolphin, Stonefish
Beech T-34: Radial Interceptor
Bell 206: Deathranger, Hydraulic palmtree
Beverly: Flying Longhouse
Bristol 188: The Mayfly
Bristol Britannia: The Whispering Giant (Was this the original WG?), Freighter version: The Whispering Warehouse
Bristol Freighter: Freightener
B707: Slush bucket, Water wagon
B727: 3 holer, Tri-jet, Trisaurus, Triple crome-plated stovepipe
B737: Tin mouse, Maggot, Pocket Rocket Socket, FLUF (Fat Little Ugly F**cker), Light Twin, Baby Boeing, Fat Freddy, Guppy, Pig, Bobby (BOeing BaBY).
B747: Jumbo Jet, Whale, The Valiant, Upstairs and Downstairs, Lump.
B747SP: Short Plane, Stupid Purchase.
B757: Stick Insect, AtariFerrari, Slippery Snake
B767: Dumpster, Slug
B777: B737 on steroids, Cripple Seven (I.F.E. Problems??), Bigfoot
B24: The Crystal ****house
B52: BUMF (Big Ugly Mother f***er) or BUFF. (Big Ugly Fat F****er)
BN 2 Islander: 225 - 2 wings, 2 engines(?) 5 Wheels, Slander, Bongo
BN 2A Trislander: Try Harder, Bloody Nice Aircraft (!), Clockwork TriStar
CA-15 Winjeel: The Ginwheel
CAC Wirraway: The "Flying Chaff-cutter" (due to its clattering engine noise)
Canberra T17: Warthog (due to its warty nose)
Casa: Christ A Sh***y Aeroplane
Cessna 150: One Filthy, the buck and a half, Cesspit
Cessna A150 Aerobat: Aerosplat
Cessna 172 Cutlass: Strutless, Gutless
Cessna 177 Cardinal: The Pontif
Cessna 207: Crowdkiller, Slug, Moneymaker
Cessna 210 Centurian: Coffin
Cessna 337 Sky Master: Sky Maggot, Push-me-Pull-you, Mix Master, Bug Smasher, Push-me-Pull-me, Blow-me-Suck-me.
Cessna 402 Utiliner: Undyliner.
Cessna Citation: Levitation, Crustacean, Mutation, Slowtation, Nearjet, Bugjet
CF100: The Lead Sled
CT-4A: (which was painted bright yellow and green in Oz Air Farce service) - the Plastic Parrot
DC 3: Dakotasaurus Rex, Gooney Bird.
DC 6: Douglasaurus Rex
DC 7: Douglas Seven Seas (From DC-7C)
DC 8: DC Late, Old Smokey, Greasy8, Death Cruiser, Whiney Bird
DC 9: Greasy 9, Diesel 9, Pocket Rocket (series 10/15 only), DC3-GT
DC 10: Diesel 10, Death Cruiser 10, Crowd Killer
MD 11: More Death 2, I also like 'Scud' for the MD-11, once you launched it, you were not sure were it was going to land.
DH 82 Tiger Moth: Terror Moth.
DH Comet: Vomit
DHC 1 Chipmonk: Chippie, Chukmonk.
DHC 4 Caribou: The Gravel Truck ("The only aircraft known to man that could suffer a birdstrike from behind".)
DHC 6 Twin Otter: Tin Otter, Twin Rotter, Twotter, Stoneboat
DHC 8 Dash Eight: Dash Late
DO 328: Dork
DO 328J: Dorkjet
Douglas Maurader: Flying Prostitute
Douglas Skywarrior: 'All Three Dead' a mixture of its awful early safety record, three crew, and its US Navy designation of A-3D
EMB110 Bandierante: Bandit, Randy Banty
EMB120 Brasillia: Garbage Can, Brakillya
EMB145: Jungle Jet, Barbie Jet, The Windows 98 Plane (seems like you spend more time rebooting the aircraft than actually flying it), Bendy Jet, Emb180 (taxi to the runway, then 180 for taxi back to ramp)
F27: The Dutch Dog Whistle, Whistle Pig, The Converter - (ie, it converted fuel into noise). F50: F**kin' Fifty
F28: WhisperJet
Fokker 100: The Scud Because they point them at Europe and they don't come back!, Dutch Oven (lousy air conditioning)
FA 18: Bug, Rhino
Fairey Gannet: Converter of Kerosene to Noise
Fairey Swordfish: Stringbag
F-4 Grey Geese, "Luftwaffen-Diesel" (due to the noticeable smoke trails)
F-100 Hun
F-102 Deuce
F-104 Starfighter Flying coffin, Widowmaker, Manned missile
F-105 The Thud
F-111: Aardvark, The Pig
Fouga: Dog-whistle, Converter, Whistling Turtle
HS125: Pocket rocket
HS748: Paraffin Budgie, the Draggie, The Twenty Ton Dog Whistle.
HS Trident: Rodent, The Gripper
Gloster Javellin: Flying Trowel, Harmonious drag master, Flat Iron
Gloster Meteor: Meatbox
Gulfstream I: G-String, G-Once
Gulfstream IV: Fourskin
IAI Westwind: Lead Sled, Jew Canoe, Heebjet, Bagel Bomber, Yom Kippur Clipper
Jaguar: Septic Cat
Katana DA20: Flying sperm
Lake Amphibian: Doctor Killer
LearJet: FearJet, Noisemaker
L Jetstar: Lawn Dart
L1011 TriStar: Bistar (Had so many RB211-22B failures), El-10-Elemon, FrightStar, Tritanic, Swamp Eater, Swamp Buggy
C130 Hercules: Fat Albert, Trash hauler, Herkybird
MD 11: Mad Dog
MD 80: Mad Dog 80
MD 95: John Holmes condom
Metroliner: San-Antonio sewerpipe, Texas Sewer Pipe, Death pencil, The Screamin Weenie, Texas Lawn Dart, Swetro (in the summer), Baltimore Whore (no visible means of support, skinny lil 'ol wings), Terror Tube, "That noisy ******* thing", Widow maker, Kerosene Crowbar, Fear tube. Garretts on a Stick
Mohawk 298/Nord 262: Pteradactyl
MU-2: Widow Maker, Hiroshima Screamer, Rice Rocket, Kill You - 2
N24 Nomad: Go-mad, Gonad
Partenavia: Part-of-Mafia, Partial Aviator, Part Banana
PA-18 Tri Pacer: Pie Chaser
PA-23 Aztec: Az-Truck
PA-28 Arrow: Sparrow
PA-28 Cherokee: Cherry Tree
PA-28 Warrior: Worrier
PA-31 Navajo: Never-go, Have-a-go
PA-38 Tomahawk: Traumahawk, Terrahawk, SpinMaster, Rat**** Hatchet
PA-44 Seminole: Semenhole
PA-60: ScareOstar.
PC12: Platypus.
PBY 5 Catalina: Pigboat, Dumbo.
RJ70/100: Real Jet
SAAB 35 Draken: Flying Trowel
SAAB J29: Flying Barrel
S3 Viking: Hoover
Shorts Belfast: Belslug
Shorts Sandringham: The Triple Decker Bus
Shorts Skyvan: The Whispering Nissan Hut
Shorts 330: The Two Tailed Shed, Horse Float, Milk Carton, Winnebago, Box Car, Short Van
Shorts 360: Box, Shoe Box, Barn, Shed, Long Short, The box that the Skyvan came in.
Sikorsky S61N: "Miss Piggy", (fat and ugly)
Strikemaster: Constant speed - variable noise machine.
Supermarine Stranraer: Whistling ****house
Supermarine Walrus: Shagbat
T-33: T Bird
T-37: Tweet
TB-10 Tobago: Toboggan - because they only perform downhill!
Tornado: Tonka
TSR-2: Throw Some Rocks Two, Teararse
VC-9 Vanguard: Vickers Vibrator
VC-9 Vanguard Merchantman: The Guards Van
VC-10: Iron Duck, Vickers Knickers
Vickers Varsity: Flying pig
Vickers Wellington: Wimpey

CRJ = Tundra Jet
SAAB340=Slaab
B1 - Bone, Lancer. Best looking plane ever!!!
Lufthansa - Let us f*** the hostess, as no steward available.
F-16: Viper
C-172: Kansas City Spam Can, Wichita Flak
CRJ: Canada's Rejected Junk
A318: Short Bus
CRJ: Canada's Reset Jet
EMB-120: Switch B1tch, Jungle Junk
E-series: Jungle Bus
B1900 - Flying Forehead
Shorts 360- Irish Icemaker
E-120- Burrito Bomber
L1011 = Whisperliner
MD-80 = Minimum Delay 80 minutes.
Lockheed C-5 Galaxy - FRED (F'ing Ridiculous Expensive Disaster)
CRJ = climb restricted jet
BE-76 Duchess Beech - b***h Dutch-ass D–bag (not sure if i can use the whole word) Dutchy
WSBOD- Whistling S*** Box of death Wanna be king Squawked
American Eagles CRJ-700 renamed CRJ-180 - It leaves the gate and makes a 180 and comes back
c-130: four fan trash can
dc-9-30: The dirty thirty
737-100/200: Thunder Guppy
Piper Arrow: The scarerrow
C-172: Flying lunchbox, skyrat
C-182: Skylame
C-206: Stationary
Dash 8: Crash Eight
Bell 206: Jet Danger
Tu-144: Concordeski
MD-80: Mx Delay, Might Depart, Longbeach Sewer Tube
JS-41: Jetscream
DA-42: Twin engine sperm cell
CRJ200: Barbie Jet
ERJ-145 Jungle Jet
Be400 beechjet: also barbie jet
17-30A bellanca super viking: termite transporter
piper pa-31p-350 mojve: NOhaveee (as in no have any performance...engineers that worked on that project started that one)
PA-44 siminole: see-men-hole
cessna 208 carravan: carry-a-van
diamond D-jet: dumb jet
BE-18: Twin Beast

Beech/Volpar 18: Travesty-on-TriGear

BE-18T Westwind III: Whirlwind

BE-50 Twin Bonanza: T-Bone

BE-60 Duke: Puke, Ugly piece of S*!t

Bell UH-1 Iroquois: Huey

Boeing 727-200(early): Stretch '72, DogRocket

CE-337 SkyMaster: Die Faster

Curtiss JN-4D: Jenny

Ford AT-5: Tin Goose

IA-1123 Commodore Jet: Commode

IA-1124 Westwind: SkyPig

Junkers Ju-52: Tante Ju

Douglas C-124: Old Shakey

Douglas MD-95: Boeing 717

Embraer E-170,175,190,195: E-180 (back to the gate)

Hughes H-4 Hercules: Spruce Goose (Howard hated that nickname)

Piper PA 38: Toma-coffin

Piper PA 44: Swimmin' Hole

Republic F-105 Thunderchief: Thud

Tupolev Tu-154: 727-ski

C-152: one sh!tty two

DA20-c1 Eclipse: Plastic wagon

Beech Jet: Beech junk, blow job, piece of ****, "oh g*d d***** not another one... top the wings 200 in the trunk with prist?"

C-17 - officially Globemaster III, unofficially has these names:
- Moose (for it's bellowing moose call noise during ground refueling)
- Barney - FRED's (C-5) little buddy
- Budda - short and fat

T-34=Tormentor

KC-135A: Strato Pig

Cessna 172: Chickenhawk
P-47: Jug
Beech Duke: Also: Hangar queen, or allergic to sunlight (Begins breaking when the hangar door opens)
Piper Chieftan: Mega-ho
Eagle 150: Snub-nosed 'Skeeter
Piper Apache: Twin Cub
Dehavilland Mosquito: wooden wonder
Dehavilland DHC-7: Quadrasaurus rex
EMB-120: 'bro

PA-44: Slowminole, Feathering Arrow

CAVU/OK--ceiling and visibility unlimited/ OK-----Greaser- a smooth landing---Tallyho!-traffic in sight---'---No joy'-negative traffic-------'hot and high' [high density altitudes]-hot tires and brakes:} ------ arrival:}---FO's hard landing---- 'A little Gusty'--Captain's hard landing:}----

PA

Geepwiz--------GPWS
Talleho---------In sight
No Joy---------Negative Contact
Bitching Betty--EGPWS
Rough Road-----Turbulent Area

Thanks everyone for more bits of banter! Everything is being put down meticulously in my nice little file.
Could you guys clear up some of the slang I've come across:

1) Home itus - is this some sort of a feeling a pilot has when close to his home airport and it can sort of obscure his judgment during approach making him land just because he is so impatient to get home even though it could be dangerous? "Itus" is something Latin or some perverted English word? Could not fugure it out.


2) FOQA, CPDLC - was not able to figure out these two acronyms.


3) Front office - is a slangy synonym for the flight deck?


4) coffin corner - have no idea what that could be.

"Fish bowl" : TCAS display,
"Keep the blue side up", good advice, unless you are flying airbatic.
" Freight dog", you'll find them at Atlanta Harstfield, at around 4 AM near a 20 series Lear or an MU-2 carrying a bunch of checks.
" Vampire flight " organ transplant flight, usually in the middle of the night. This one I credit myself for.
Credit to Wikipedia:
"The coffin corner or Q-Corner is the altitude at or near which an aircraft's stall speed is equal to the critical Mach number, at a given gross weight and G loading. At this altitude the aircraft becomes nearly impossible to keep in stable flight. Since the stall speed is the minimum speed required to maintain level flight, any reduction in speed will cause the airplane to stall and lose altitude. Since the critical Mach number is maximum speed at which air can travel over the wings without losing lift to flow separation and shock waves, any increase in speed will cause the airplane to lose lift, or to pitch heavily nose-down, and lose altitude. The "corner" refers to the triangular shape at the top of a flight envelope chart where the stall speed and critical Mach number lines come together. Some aircraft, such as the Lockheed U-2, routinely operate in the "coffin corner", which demands great skill from their pilots."

So there I was yanking and banking, punching holes in the sky, teasing the stall warner and climbing like a homesick angel...

bucket and spade, oh, what a gem!
Thanks a ton for the dictionary!

XD, the term "-itis" is derived from Greek and means "inflammation" in medical terms. For example Tonsilitis is an inflammation of the tonsils.

It is often applied incorrectly as a suffix to made-up maladies (like "Get-home-itis") to make them sound like genuine medical disorders, or to describe something (as in this case) which would take a whole sentance to explain otherwise.

Of course, in this case it would translate as' inflammation of the get home', which makes no sense. However, although technically incorrect everybody understands to what Get-Home-itis refers....the desire to land and get home overrides potentially more sensible decisions.

No-one's mentioned "donkey" yet (or "donk" for short). I'm no expert, but I understand this to mean an aircraft engine. The engine is also referred to by my instructor on single engine a/c as the "air conditining unit" because when it stops mid-flight everyone on board immediately starts to sweat.

:ok:

Front office = pointy end = best view in the house = cockpit/Flight deck.

Metal or aluminium tube = aeroplane.

Burning kero = burn fuel. Kerosene aka Jet A 1.

Thumped it in = heavy-ish landing.

Carved my initials on the runway = heavy-ish landing.

Burn holes in the sky = holding pattern.

Top of Drop = Top of Descent.

Box = FMS or radio units.

Mark 1 eyeball = your eyes.

SLF = Self loading freight = passengers.

The opposite to "Climbs like a homesick angel" is
"Descends like a homesick brick".

Rattling clouds = Thunderstorms

Sparking clouds = Thunderstorms

Solid clouds = Hail

Clouds with ice = Hail

Chucking it down = Raining heavily.

CB = Cumulo Nimbus. Big fat tall thundery type of cloud.

Cumulo Granitus = fake latin for terrain. Cumulo = type of cloud, Granitus = granite, a type of rock.

Hope this helps.
:ok:

B717/MD-95 performance is exceptional -- it climbs like a fart in a bathtub.


Once flew a Cessna 210 without weather radar into a tropical cumolonimbus. The turbulence had it shaking like a dog sh!tting pinecones.

If that bad boy (CB) moves close enough to the strip (airfield) to make our arse's twitch (concern us) we will throw it away (discontinue the approach/or go-around) and go and burn the profit margin (hold till its passed) then have another crack (before returning for a successful approach and landing) then taxi in for tea and medals (complete post flight paper work).

I am going positively fly this onto the gound - we are late and I want to make the high speed turn-off!

Turn em and burn em - starting number 2.

just fly the needles - Oh cr*p the FMC has packed up, just fly a raw data arrival/departure

Capt's weather - CALM CAVOK
FO's weather - 35G45 across, +RN,

Engine room/pointy bit - flight deck

Best dirty her up - think you need gear and or flaps!

Punchy approach - bit fast and high!

Puddle jumpers - light singles

Is that change legal? - please don't give me that duty as i think i might die from exhaustion!

Aero Slang
 

Hola Xolodenko - Privet
xxx
Zdrasvuitye... Ochen priyatnya - sorry - no Cyrillic alphabet here.
I see you have been giving and receiving a lot of slang words or acronyms...
xxx
Be aware that there are notorious differences between UK and Yank aviation slang.
I have lived 25 yrs in the USA, so my aviation English is from Yankistan.
xxs
With my airline in the US, sure, there was "George" for the autopilot...
But sometimes we also joked - saying -
"A German approach" - (for "coupled approach") using the "OTTOpilot"...
"A Mexican approach" - (for hand flown, manual) since MANUEL is common name in Mexico...
xxx
We used to remember QNH and QFE altimeter settings this way -
QNH was for Normal Humans (in the USA, standard procedure) -
QFE for "F*** Europeans" - landing with "0" on altimeter as you do in Russia -
xxx
Did you know that when we went to MOCKBA... if our traffic was a Ilyushyn IL-62, we would nickname them "Veecee-ten-ski", for their resemblance to the British VC-10... We would call the IL-76 "One-Forty-Oneskis" due to their resemblance to the Lockheed C-141... and the TU-134 was a Deecee-nine-ski, again due to their look. The TU-154 was a "Seven-twenty-seven-ski"...
I guess we could do same for the 757 with the TU-204...
Well, we did same for your cars, the LADA, we called it the "Fiatski"...
And a ZIL or Tshayka was a Lincolnski...
xxx
Before SLF was coined, we used to say "SOB" - not for souls-on-board - but son-of-a-bitch. I think SLF is nicer.
xxx
Hope that Trans-Aero is doing good with their old 747-200s... I am the pilot who delivered them to Domodedovo from their storage in the California desert in 2005... Nice bunch of pilots. I don't like vodka, but instead, we had a few "Baltikas" together in Moscow... I love Russian beer, hate Budweiser...
xxx
Tally-ho is indeed fighter pilot jargon for "target" (traffic) in sight...
No-joy, should you have missed (not seen) that target = miss the joy to shoot him down...
Douglas DC-8s were DC "late" as they were slower than the 707, or did not sell as good.
Also called the Santa Monica "cable cars" - due to profusion of cables to operate flight controls.
The little Learjet is called the "Fearjet" - as the old ones were sobering machines for some pilots...
The early Citations were known as "Slo-tations" - their cruise speed being slow...
We said that Citations need a weather radar in the tail - to prevent "bird strikes" from the rear...
The Mitsubishi MU-2 was the Rice-Rocket...
Here, we nickname all Embraer Jets, the "Samba Jets"...
Our presidential "air force one" plane in Argentina is a 757, "T-1" (Tango One) -
Quite appropriate that "T" is Tango = our national dance...
xxx
Dosvidanya -
Happy contrails :)

BelArgUSA, thanks a lot for your post! A mighty chunk of slang to add to my file!

1. Yes, I am aware that pprune.org is a UKish forum so most of the slang I will get here will apply to UK flight ops only. I've posted a similar thread on Airline Pilot Central, which is where US flying folks are hanging around but the response was great deal poorer than here. Anyways, I am really grateful to all who shared their stuff and I am actually kind of surpirsed that the response to this thread here was so hugely different from that on the APC forum.

2. We also have plenty of nicknames for aircraft up here in Russia but they are mostly for Soviet-made planes so they won't be of much interest for you. As for Western-made jets, generic nickname for Boeing is "Bobik" (has no meaning in English, just a Russian word which looks closest to "Boeing" and it's actually a popular name for a dog). Airbus is called "Arbuz" (Aarbuuuz), which is "watemelon". But again this is not because this plane looks like a watermelon, it's just a Russian word, which looks closest to "Airbus".
Then we have a couple of nicknames for specific models:
B 737 - "Little Boeing"
B 747 - "A humpy one"
B 777 - "Three axes" ("7" looks like an axe)

Nothing really ingenious, the nicknames for Soviet planes are much more witty but they just won't make sense if translated into English.

Soviet planes you've mentioned:
Tu-134 - Whistle (its engine makes a whistling sound), Fighter Jet (probably because it's pretty fast), Little Tupolev

Tu-154 - Fifty, Steam Engine, Big Tupolev

Il-62 - Log (Timber)

Il-76 - called a "Hump" too


Cheers from your strategic "friend" Russia, the home of vodka-drunk bears with their pawns always on the nuke launch button!:}:}

.. there was I , nothing on the clock except the makers name in arabic...

Njet, I belive QFE is a mostly a British eccentricity, so not generally European.

L1011- swamp buggy

"BOEING" Bits Of Engine In Neighbours Garden

Shorts 360 ... the Irish Concorde

<<" Vampire flight " organ transplant flight, usually in the middle of the night. This one I credit myself for.>>

Or "Offal flight".

CB = CumuloBumpulus

Window Job... Where landing aircraft are so close, all the radar controllers run to peer outside.

B747 - in BOAC/BA called Dilbert

First officers - Nigels

The Italians refer to the BAe146 as the "Jumbolina" (little jumbo).

Boeing 747SP = Sainsbury's chicken.
Typhoon = Eurof*rter.
L1011 = Lockheed T*rdstar.
C141 = Lockheed Shirt-lifter.
C17 = Thunderbird 2.
Holding-pattern = The perpetual dogfight in progress over the radio-facility serving the airfield.