Conflicts Please Advise

[triplese7en]

I think it's obvious that you should tell whoever you're talking to who you are! So when you make a radio call in uncontrolled airspace, tell them 1) your 3D position (bearing and distance from a known point plus your altitude), and 2) your intentions. That's it.

3D position and intentions.

And keep it short.

[Colonel Sanders]

I don't bother with altitude. Over 99% of the time,
it just doesn't matter:

"Ten north, inbound two-seven"

And that's it. Only if someone else is ten north
does my altitude matter. Obviously I will be
descending to join the circuit via overhead. If
someone can't figure that out, well, maybe they
should take up golf.

Talk less. Fly more.

[triplese7en]

I'd be inclined to say "ten miles north, inbound runway two-seven".

Operators in the boonies in Ontario like to say as little as possible, as fast as possible. "Sandy papa alpha bravo ten south two seven in eight." If you're not actively listening to the radio you're gonna miss one or two details of that call.

I'm not asking for a paragraph, I just want a call that is short and concise, spoken at a decent rate, with appropriate breaks/pauses. No, I don't want to hear on 26.7 what runway you're landing on.

[Colonel Sanders]

The key to good R/T is to not talk too fast,
with the minimum number of syllables to
convey the same information. That yields
the highest signal-to-noise ratio. This is
important when the frequency gets busy.

For me "ten north" is unambiguous. We
do not use furlongs or meters or light-years
as units of aviation navigational measurement
in Canada.

When I hear "ten north", that means ten miles,
with no possible confusion.

Similarly, when I say that I am "inbound two-seven"
or "inbound one-four" there is no confusion that I
am intending to land on rwy 27 or rwy 14, respectively.

"two-seven" and "one-four" do not refer to lanes
in the bowling alley near the airport. Nor are they
the names of restaurants. They are not even altitudes.

Fewer syllables yields an objectively superior radio call.
That doesn't matter to most people, who jabber on
endlessly about useless nonsense, because they feel
important when they transmit on the radio.

[Shiny Side Up]

New thing learned for the day: the french "confleet" is as irritating as the Anglo "conflicts" upon repetition.

[Colonel Sanders]

Recently I taught someone to land a Pitts, which
I am sure is easy for all the AvCan posters, but ...

Anyways, we do a circuit pretty quickly. About
2.5 minutes. If I was a typical private pilot,
enamoured with the sound of my own voice,
I could probably completely tie up the UNICOM
frequency with useless crap, making it impossible
for all the pilots at all the different airports who
share that frequency, to get a word in edgewise.

However, I elect not to do that. Instead my
radio calls are only thusly:

"Tee Pee Ess, downwind zero six"
"Tee Pee Ess, final zero six"

And that's it, that's all folks. I am waiting
patiently for some dinglenuts to try to tear
me a new one, for not mentioning the airport
name.

However, I have been actively flying at this
particular airport now for over a quarter of
a century, and I happen to know that no
airport sharing that UNICOM frequency
(including the ones in Quebec and NY) have
a runway 06.

So, when dinglenuts tears me a new one
for not mentioning the airport in my radio
calls, I will politely ask him if he has a
runway 06 at his distant airport.

When he says no, I will tell him that my
radio call is not for his airport, because
it does not have a runway 06.

This is pretty complicated logic for a pilot
to follow, but I believe that with some
practice and concentration, they can step
up to it.

[Pop n Fresh]

"Uhhhhhh... Ten North, could you say again what you're north of?"

There must be better frequency use there. I was flying here and we could hear radio calls intended for a couple of airports many many miles from the one we were going to use which for some reason had the same frequency. The only reason I knew was they included that info in the call. "Three Hills traffic." Not sure why they sounded nice and clear being so far away.

[Colonel Sanders]

There must be better frequency use

I know. Everyone has at least 720 channel radios
(not everyone has 760, I have learned) so there is
no excuse as to why busy uncontrolled airports must
share common frequencies. On a sunny weekend,
it's insane. Trying to deal with NavCan on this issue
to get frequencies changed is like trying to reroute a
glacier.

This is yet another reason why the radio is useless
and you must LOOK OUTSIDE.

Dumb suggestion: take some of the uncontrolled
airports on 122.70 and move them to 122.72 and
122.77. For 122.80, move them to 122.82 and
122.87. I know, too simple. Maybe we can have
an all-expenses-paid Senate inquiry look into it
and after ten years of travelling around the
country feeding from the public trough expense
account, they could get back to us with a 10,000
page report. Probably wouldn't cost more than
$10,000,000. A real deal at $1,000 per page
and as any bureaucrat will tell you, there is no
cost to a 10 year implementation delay.

[Pop n Fresh]

They are adding position reporting frequencies due to necessity now they have closed the FSS units.

126.7 possibly will not even available soon. Could cause some excitement during the transition.

[Colonel Sanders]

re: 126.70

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_ser ... _in_Canada

Canadian FIC are gradually phasing out the use of 126.7 MHz for FISE (Enroute Flight Information) and are instead utilizing discrete frequencies.

This is to decrease the frequency congestion often experienced on 126.7. These frequencies are found in the CFS Canada Flight Supplement.

[Pop n Fresh]

You don't want to weigh yourself down with the phone book do you?

[Docbrad]

126.7 possibly will not even available soon.

It is my understanding that they are not "shutting off" 126.7 but they are just moving all of the FSS/FIC to their own frequencies. Position reporting in uncontrolled airspace is still done on 126.7

IFR = Mandatory reports
VFR = Recommended

[ScottS]

I tried raising Pacific Radio on 126.7 once or twice last year since I was as close to Kamloops than any of the RCOs on the discreet frequencies. Was met with silence. Instant response on the RCO frequency.

[Strega]

I was out flying west of Calgary on the weekend...

from all over southern Alberta on 126.7 I was hearing this garbage on the radio " xyz is currently over no where at 7200, bla bla bla, any and all conflicts please advise"

It was soo bad, I actually turned the radio off, and enjoyed the rest of my flight


Why are kids being taught this trash ?

Anyone?

[Pop n Fresh]

You can't blame it on teaching alone. It's nervous reflexes and very contagious. "Everyone else says it. I better."

[Colonel Sanders]

Why are kids being taught this trash?

They don't spend any time teaching them
stick & rudder skills, so they have all this
time left over to teach them really bad R/T.

[mike123]

It was soo bad, I actually turned the radio off, and enjoyed the rest of my flight

This is what I do as well - turn the radio off as soon as I leave the circuit. With five busy airports on the same frequency all you hear is constant white noise.

Why are kids being taught this trash ?

Kids don't know yet how to prioritize and think that the more you say on the radio the more "professional" you sound.

[Shiny Side Up]

Why are kids being taught this trash?

They don't spend any time teaching them
stick & rudder skills, so they have all this
time left over to teach them really bad R/T.

The question that really needs to be addressed though, is who taught the instructors. Given the spread of the ACTPA clearly its not a recent thing. Its only became more annoying since there's more pilots out there saying it. That it has also spread to (or from) the French radio lexicon also speaks volumes (pun intended). Since its also not limited to the fixed wing world, I have a hard time believing that it has a direct correlation to bad stick skills.

[Colonel Sanders]

five busy airports on the same frequency ... turn the radio off

See previous comment about NavCan not giving
a sh1t and refusing to use available unused
frequencies to solve this problem.

Note however that when NavCan decided to phase
out 126.7, all of a sudden it found plenty of free
FISE frequencies for it's own use.

Dumb suggestion: take some of the uncontrolled
airports on 122.70 and move them to 122.72 and
122.77. For 122.80, move them to 122.82 and
122.87. I know, too simple. Maybe we can have
an all-expenses-paid Senate inquiry look into it
and after ten years of travelling around the
country feeding from the public trough expense
account, they could get back to us with a 10,000
page report. Probably wouldn't cost more than
$10,000,000. A real deal at $1,000 per page
and as any bureaucrat will tell you, there is no
cost to a 10 year implementation delay.

[Tailwind W10]

I heard a new one a couple of days ago. Flying Wetaskiwin - Camrose I heard someone on 126.7 end his position report with "... Conflicts (registration) (location)". He didn't use the whole phrase, just the word. It sounded like he was just too damn lazy to say the whole thing. Maybe he'll start a whole new annoying trend.

Gerry