Air Traffic Control versus Pilots
Have you been cleared into the ramp?
Ok, cleared to the ramp.
Now, that was a question. Have the ramp people cleared you into the gate?
Roger to the gate Air China 981.
Coming up!
Hey 74 Crew. Welcome back!
If you don't know me, my name is Kelsey. I'm a 747 pilot.
My channel 74 Gear is all about aviation.
Over the last couple years, I've had several people send me this clip on Instagram
of Air China in JFK.
And asked me: "How can this happen to a
professional pilot that's flying internationally?"
And I've had a few other clips sent to me as well.
So I put them all together
and today we're doing Air Traffic Control versus Pilots.
Let's get into it.
Speedbird 15 kilo heavy speed 180 or greater til 5 DME.
I can't do that ma'am I can be 160 or great until 5.
Ok, you've gotta give me more than 160 from now though so when are you gonna slow to 160
Ya, I get that ma'am but I am flying a 747 and I have stabilized approach criteria which I must maintain.
Ok and you still haven't answered my question so whenever you get around to that that'd be great
Ok reducing now to 160 knots
Alright approach clearance cancelled turn left heading 130.
Ok, approach cancelled turn left heading please?
To 130.
130 and the reason for that is?
I just need to maintain 160 for at least 3 more miles
This is clearly a pissing contest between Air Traffic Control and the Pilots
and here the pilot is reminding her that he's a 747 pilot.
Ya, I get that ma'am but I am flying a 747 and I have stabilized approach criteria which I must maintain.
That's not something you ever need to tell Air Traffic Control.
They know what type of plane you're flying.
They know what the capabilities and the normal speeds are of your plane
because they deal with it on a daily basis.
It'd be one thing if you're going into a small airport
that isn't used to dealing with your type of an aircraft
but JFK has been seeing 747s for a long time.
So they know the types of speeds they can generally give you
and get you to do in order to accomplish what
it is that they want to accomplish on their end.
The pilot is saying he cannot do it because of stabilized approach criteria
which is a real thing. That does exist.
And I have stabilized approach criteria which I must maintain.
I don't know what their approach criteria is for British Airways
and their Callsign Speed Birds
so that's who they're talking to.
I don't know what their approach criteria is.
For us, it's to be stable at a thousand feet.
A few things that will typically be in stabilized approach criteria
are things like the power settings.
So you're going to want the power setting to be something that'd be normal for that.
You're not going to want full power, you're not going to want idle power.
If you've ever seen me do any of the Microsoft Flight Sim games,
all of that is unstabilized approach.
So you see what he's saying here is,
he needs to have it at a certain setting.
But I think he could have gotten away with doing exactly what she was asking of him.
This is an approach plate from Jeppesen
which is what 90% of the airlines use.
The controller wanted 180 knots or greater to 5 DME.
That means she wanted him to be doing 180 knots
until they were 5 miles out from the airport.
DME means distance measuring equipment.
So she's saying:
Until you're five miles DME, five miles from the airport
I want you to do 180 knots.
Some airlines like mine give you until a thousand feet to be stabilized.
So let's assume that British Airways has those same
requirements of having to be stable at a thousand feet.
Zulab here is 5.3 miles from the runway.
Which is pretty close to the five miles she's asking for.
He could have had the gear down and the flap set at 25 degrees for landing
as he approached Zulab.
Doing 180 knots as the aircraft crossed here,
he could have just reduced the speed down 20 knots
and with the gear and flaps down, that plane would slow down very quickly.
By having the gear down and the flaps out like that makes
the engines work a little bit harder on your approach
but you still could have accomplished everything that you needed to accomplish
and everything she wanted you to accomplish.
There would have been roughly two miles to slow down before hitting a thousand feet.
And I’m not a math wizard.
These approach plates that they use make it really simple.
You can see here, 1160 feet you're three miles from the runway.
I'm just doing basic ballpark math which is really my
kind of math you can ask any of my teachers in school.
Instead what the pilot decided to do is flex that he's a 747 pilot which I get it
I'm a 747 pilot and you hear me talk about it in every video
but by doing that it made the controller flex back and say: "okay,
you're going to break off your approach"
Which is essentially controller speak for
"you're going to go to the back of the line"
At the end of the day you have to follow your company's protocols and procedures
and do what is going to be safest for your aircraft, your crew and your passengers.
But ATC (Air Traffic Control) generally know what you can and cannot do.
So if there's something that's going to be a
little bit unique or different about your flight,
that's something that you should be advising them ahead of time.
Like I said,
when are coming in really heavy and there's a
lot of small planes that we can hear them around,
we'll tell them ahead of time "Hey, we're going to be coming in very fast"
so that way they can give us extra room to get
and close down on that aircraft ahead of us
Maybe they're normally giving three miles of separation between each plane
and they might give us five or six.
And they're able to kind of figure out how much room
they need to give you based on how fast you need to go.
I think they honestly could have both done a little bit better here.
The pilot didn't need to flex, he could have done more to help them.
Go maybe faster a little longer, ask "hey can we
do it until six miles?" or something like that.
Instead what he wanted to do is say like: "I'm the boss"
and at the end of the day Air Traffic Control is
coordinating a lot of different planes that are around there
So it's better to work with them and ask: "Hey, can I do it till six?"
or "Can I do 170?"
or ask something instead of just try to lay down the law
like "I'm the boss and this is what I’m going to do".
The only time you can really do that is when you declare an emergency
and then it's when you're going to do whatever you want
and that's not what's happening here.
All right, let's see what's next.
Did you check in?
Yes we're trying to 4R.
American 1728 thanks could you accept Runway 4L
I am afraid. We’re just a little bit committed to 4R.
Are you saying you have commitment issues sir?
We want to stay on 4R.
I understand just a little joke American 1728
Following a bus short final, traffic holding crossing runway wind 010 at 14 runway 4R cleared to land
Cleared to land runway 4R American 1728 I got it bud.
I don't know which airport this is
but let's just say it's Boston since they have a
four left and a four right with a crossing runway.
Sometimes it'll happen when you're lined up to land on a runway,
Air Traffic Control will ask you if you want to swap to a parallel runway
or maybe one on the other side of the airport.
Sometimes it's to help you out and sometimes it's to help them out.
If you're the pilot flying as soon as you hear this:
American 1728 thanks could you accept Runway 4L
You're going to want to quickly evaluate
your options and that's going to be based off of
what you're set up for, your flying ability,
the weather conditions and all those things.
Because what's going to happen is the other pilot is just going to look at you
and they're going to want a very quick response because usually you're
lined up on a runway and you're going to need to make that decision quickly.
So as soon as you hear the Air Traffic Control asking that,
you need to already be making that decision
because as soon as they look at you, you're going to tell them:
"Yes, we can do it or no we can't".
Realize that if you decide to make the decision to get off of your approach
and get onto another runway,
that may be helping Air Traffic Control or maybe helping you. It depends.
But you're also going to have things that are not going to be loaded up.
That means you're going to disconnect and hand fly.
It means your approach isn't going to have the autopilot
and everything set up if you need to do a missed approach.
There's a lot of different things and it's all going
to also depend on what your company procedures are.
So you got to kind of factor all that in in a very quick second
because you need to make a decision quickly.
I personally have done both.
I said: "Yes, let's make the switch"
and we jump over.
and I've had other times where I say: "No, no. I don't want to do it".
It all just depends on the circumstances, how
you're feeling, everything that's going on
and you want to take the safest way and the safest decision every time.
Let's take a look at this here at Boston Airport.
He's asking him to switch from this one to this one.
And the reason may be he wants to have someone take off from runway nine here.
You don't have to take decision to swap the runways.
They aren't going to be mad at you.
You aren't going to get a free beer once you land.
It doesn't really matter.
They're asking if you can do it.
The next thing you hear him say is traffic on the crossing runway.
Following a bus short final, traffic holding crossing runway wind 010 at 14 runway 4R cleared to land
I assume he wanted to let someone take off from runway nine here.
I've flown out of Boston a lot.
I remember nine being one that they would take off from
but it could have been any of these runways.
Also, you could hear Air Traffic Control making some jokes
and the pilots are being a bit dry.
Sometimes, it's the pilot's making joke.
It's air traffic control not getting. Sometimes the other way around.
Just like in every business, you're gonna have
people that are fun and want to have some laughs
and other people who just want to keep it all business.
I will say, from my experience,
that's not something you want to do early on in your career.
I don't really hear it from any other controllers other places in the world
but I do hear it between American pilots and American controllers.
I hear it more there than anywhere else in the world.
And I think that has something to do with the language barrier.
Obviously, when you're in other places in the world,
you typically aren't going to be making jokes as
things may get lost in the communication there.
I have seen a lot of times when we check in, let's say in South America
or in Europe,
we might check in and say like "Hello"
or a "Good day" in their language
but that's about it.
That's about as far as the joking goes.
The rest of it is a very standard phraseology and the things that you're doing.
I generally only hear the jokes happening like
that between American pilots and American controllers
because it's the same. The controllers don't want foreign pilots to be confused
If they make a joke like that, it may get lost in translation.
All right, let's get to the next one.
Air China 981 make the right turn here at Juliet join Alpha hold short of Mike Alpha
Right here on Juliet... hold taxiway Alpha hold on November now we continue taxi now?
Make the right turn here at Juliet join Alpha hold short of Mike Alpha Air China 981
Air China 981 roger join right Juliet join Alpha hold short of November.
Ok, I'll say it again hold short of Mike Alpha M-A not November
Ok hold short Mike Alpha 981
Well, this is a super famous Air Traffic Control versus Pilot video.
I'm sure many of you have heard it.
There's more of the video which I'm going to get into in just a second.
Sometimes, Air Traffic Control at airports and this is just my opinion,
in some cities like New York, LaGuardia, Chicago,
They speak very fast and it's hard for me as a native English
speaker sometimes to put together everything that's happening.
That's not really the case in this specific circumstance.
But sometimes, you'll hear them talking very fast
and you hear foreign pilots get a little bit lost.
And that's just because there's so much that's happening on those airports
that they need to keep all the planes moving.
Personally, I think it'd be better if they spoke slower but
I'm not up there so I don't know what their workload
is like and how they're coordinating everything.
Even though English is the primary language for aviation
and that works out great for me as being an American,
I've seen pilots that have struggled from international pilots,
also new pilots struggle when Air Traffic Control especially on ground with taxing.
They get overwhelmed with everything that's going on.
That being said, it's always better to clarify before you make a mistake.
If the other pilot doesn't hear what was being
said or didn't hear or didn't understand,
it's better to clarify.
Ask Air Traffic Control: "Hey, did you say this or did you say that?"
That's not what's happening in this situation.
Air Traffic Control is speaking in a very calm cool slow way
for Air China to understand
and you're going to see why in a second they didn't understand it.
Here's a chart that we use to taxi in JFK.
I'm going to make some assumptions.
The plane is right here
Air Traffic Control is telling them to go right on Juliet.
Join Alpha
and hold short of Mike Alpha up here.
So now it kind of gives you an idea of where
they're at in the airport and what's going on.
Now, let me play you the second part.
Air China 981, have they cleared you into the ramp?
Roger ramp, ramp Air China 981
Ok, they have cleared you into the ramp?
Air China 981 ground.
Air China 981 Kennedy ground.
981 go ahead.
Have you been cleared into the ramp?
Ok, cleared to the ramp.
No, that was a question. Have the ramp people cleared you into the gate?
Roger to the gate Air China 981
I'll try it again it's a question, hold your position.
This is a question an interrogative. Have you been cleared into your gate?
Ok, we hold here.
Ok, how about the question? Have they cleared you into the gate?
Tower... ground air China 981 uhh we are uhh gate number 3 is open taxi to the November.
Air China 981 taxi to the ramp.
Roger, taxi to the ramp.
Okay, obviously I added the clips of Snoop Dogg in there and
and because it's kind of what I imagined them doing when they weren't responding.
Obviously, that's not what was really going on.
You might be wondering how can someone say Mike
Alpha and the other person here in November?
They don't sound anything alike.
There's something that you may not know if you're not an airline pilot
and that's before you land at a given runway, you're
given the gate that you're going to be parking at.
Usually, once you land the ground control might ask where you're parking at,
and you need to know where you're going to go.
And you also need to plan once you land where you're going to be taxing to get there.
Honestly, on the ground there is a lot more
going on for the pilots than up in the air.
You heard the pilot say gate number three is open.
Tower... ground air China 981 uhh we are uhh gate number 3 is open taxi to the November.
That means the pilot knows he's parking at gate number three.
The reason that's important is because there's something known as Expectation Bias.
Expectation bias is when you say something and
assume already what's going to be sent back to you.
You've seen that with guys. You go out and they go up to a girl and they say:
"Oh, I'm a pilot"
and the girl is like "Nobody cares what you do, Vic".
But your pilot friend here is: "Playing a baby in me".
That is expectation bias.
It works the other way as well.
You've seen a lot of movies a guy will walk up to a pretty girl in a bar
and he'll ask her for her number
and she'll say: "Yeah, I'll give you my number"
and he goes: "I understand, you don't want to talk to me" and then walk away.
It's the same thing.
You're going into something with an expectation of what's going to be told to you
not listening to what's actually happening.
The other thing that you don't get from this audio is that JFK has a lot going on
and that is once you land, you have to contact
while you're listening to the ground frequency.
You have to contact the ramp frequency
and find out if your gate is open and if you're cleared into the gate.
Then, you have to come back to ground until ground ramp clear descent.
They don't coordinate that for you like in a lot of airports.
I personally would love to see that the ground and ramp control can
coordinate those things without having the pilots be monitoring the ground,
calling to the ramp while taxing a couple hundred thousand
pounds of airplane and a few hundred people behind them.
But I’m not in charge of those things.
Take a look at the ramp chart here at JFK.
Here is parking spot number three
which is where they're going to be parking.
And he keeps saying November.
why November?
Well, now you see why.
It's the entry into his parking area.
On the approach coming in there, the pilots probably talked about it several
times of how they were going to land and how they were going to taxi in.
And they kept planning on a November entry.
Some pilots aren't able to think outside the box and don't listen carefully.
These pilots were obviously not listening carefully enough
when the guy kept saying Mike Alpha.
They kept hearing November because November is what they planned on.
So, it's very important this expectation bias
that you don't hear what you're expecting to hear.
You listen to what's being said.
All right, last one.
Air France 6, what gate are you waiting for?
Air France 6 still waiting for our gate
Ya so what gate would that be?
Gate 8 Air France
Ground Air France 006 super gate 8 is available for us
No its not, they lied to you, so just hold there. I'll call you when its available.
I don't need you to tell me what I can see and you can't
Ok.
So this is an Air France A380.
You know it's an A380 because they have the callsign Super.
You have a 747, that's going to be a heavy.
A lot of different larger aircraft will be heavy.
There's only one Super and that's the airbus A380.
I just love the way the French say Super.
You just couldn't say it more French than that.
Ground Air France 006 super gate 8 is available for us
I got a buddy of mine and we've been friends for a long time
and sometimes when we hang out
there's certain words that he says I'm like:
"You say that's so French. It's just so funny to me"
This is my take on this.
The controller was being aggressive and rude to Air France unnecessarily.
Air France was told they were cleared into park.
The controller didn't need to be that aggressive and say:
"You don't know, this is what's going on for real".
Wasn't necessary.
I knew as soon as that pilot said: "okay",
and un-keyed the mic,
he said a bunch of probably terrible things to the other pilots in French.
I know that I would have if I was in their situation
and probably over the years I had
and sometimes when a pilot does that, what you say is:
"Stuck Mike"
is you kind of joke around because you obviously wouldn't be wanting
to transmit all the terrible things that you said about the controller.
But it wasn't necessary for this controller to be this rude to this pilot.
And the pilot just said okay.
Because there's no reason to push back on it.
The controller is going to do what they want to do.
If you want to go to the gate and file a
report you can is something going to change...
Probably not.
if you like these video breakdowns, you're going to love my
viral debrief series where I break down different videos.
I'll put a link to that video right here.
And if you want to see something more fun,
check out my Hollywood versus reality.
I'll put a link to that video up here.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Until then, keep the blue side up.