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Yeah, I have listened in on some air traffic controller streams that are available online and it's always hard to decipher what it is they are saying. It all so

Yeah, I have listened in on some air traffic controller streams that are available online and it's always hard to decipher what it is they are saying. It all sounds like words slurred together with no clear demarcation. I am mostly amazed how pilots and the controllers clearly understand each speaking the way they do.

waster 13y ago
Also, kudos to the tower. It is seriously an amazing thing they do, and to stay cool and calm and efficient all during a crash, to keep the rest of the traffic clear and headed in the right direction.
ams6110 13y ago
It's part learned jargon and part ritual... also (though I don't know) probably easier to hear in a headset than on a low bitrate mp3 recording.
VLM 13y ago
The engineering term to google is data redundancy with a bit of communication theory and stuff like that. 0:32-0:36 Tower: "Skywest 5452, San Francisco Tower, runway 28 right, cleared to land" 0:36-0:38 Skywest 5452 pilot: "Clear to land, 28 right, Skywest 5452" This looks like 6 seconds of jargon containing about 25 words, but it really only contains one single bit of information that being that in the giant state machine of flowchart of flying a plane, everyone mutually agrees its your turn to click forward precisely one step. Once you look at it that way, the "conceptual bit rate" drops dramatically lower. 5452 probably expected to get 28R all along, and based on where he was probably expected to get clearance "right about then" too. "Hey you, its me, you can land over there" "Hey you, its me, I think heard you say I can land over there" (with the implied, if I misheard, you'd best start yelling right about now either at me or at everyone else to get out of my way) When its just business as usual, things click along awful fast. When ATC gives out some "unpredictable" order or a pilot has a weird request, there's always a very dramatic pause due to cognitive load. I can have my scanner monitoring the local tower for fun and Very quickly you learn to tune out BAU chatter until/unless weird tempo strikes. You can also tell purely by cadence and tempo with near perfect accuracy if the pilot is a local or a noob in general or a distant traveler.

waster 13y ago

Also, kudos to the tower. It is seriously an amazing thing they do, and to stay cool and calm and efficient all during a crash, to keep the rest of the traffic clear and headed in the right direction.

ams6110 13y ago

It's part learned jargon and part ritual... also (though I don't know) probably easier to hear in a headset than on a low bitrate mp3 recording.

VLM 13y ago

The engineering term to google is data redundancy with a bit of communication theory and stuff like that. 0:32-0:36 Tower: "Skywest 5452, San Francisco Tower, runway 28 right, cleared to land" 0:36-0:38 Skywest 5452 pilot: "Clear to land, 28 right, Skywest 5452" This looks like 6 seconds of jargon containing about 25 words, but it really only contains one single bit of information that being that in the giant state machine of flowchart of flying a plane, everyone mutually agrees its your turn to click forward precisely one step. Once you look at it that way, the "conceptual bit rate" drops dramatically lower. 5452 probably expected to get 28R all along, and based on where he was probably expected to get clearance "right about then" too. "Hey you, its me, you can land over there" "Hey you, its me, I think heard you say I can land over there" (with the implied, if I misheard, you'd best start yelling right about now either at me or at everyone else to get out of my way) When its just business as usual, things click along awful fast. When ATC gives out some "unpredictable" order or a pilot has a weird request, there's always a very dramatic pause due to cognitive load. I can have my scanner monitoring the local tower for fun and Very quickly you learn to tune out BAU chatter until/unless weird tempo strikes. You can also tell purely by cadence and tempo with near perfect accuracy if the pilot is a local or a noob in general or a distant traveler.