This may not be the best place in the thread to put this, however,
here we go. This, from Fox News, makes it clear ATC is saying they
screwed up. The time to beat up on the pilot is AFTER the airplane is
on the ground. "Emergency" does mean the pilot owns the sky, details
and blame will be sorted out later.

That has always been my understanding. The pilot still has to answer
for his/her actions, but the Q&A doesn't start until the emergency
situation is over.

This is not necessarily the correct place in the thread for this question,
but it is at least amoung the most recent.

I noticed that this incident actually occurred on or about August 31, 2006,
which was about six months ago--even though it has been a television news
item and also subject of debate on this news group over the past couple of
days.

My question is this: Does anyone here have a working link to either the
audio tape of the incident or a transcript of the tape?

My justification for asking is that "phraseology" is a frequent topic of
lecture and discussion at Wings Seminars, and I and curious as to what was
actually said. IFAIK, there only two or three ways to say "emergency" plus
one additional way to say "fuel critical"--none of which were specifically
quoted in any of the links which I was able to find.

I am not concluding, just very curious.
Peter