Hi,

In article ,
Bertie the wrote:
But, like sticking to imperial measurements, I think you stand alone.

What, like altitude in feet, altimiter settings in inches of mercury,
distance in miles, volume in gallons? Mr. Kettle, allow me to introduce
you to Mr. Pot

Britain is still clinging to a number of archaic aviation terms (you
still gotta know which direction to go whatever you choose to call it!)
One of my favorites is the "Pan" call. Nobody uses that anymore except
you guys. I had an entertaining few minutes in Germany listening to some
Nigel making one of these a few years back. It went something like this.
The Nigel Skipper is played Terry Thomas and the German controller by
Hardy Kruger in this re-creation.

Boffo Air 2234 "Rhine, Boffo 2234, PAN PAN PAN"
ATC "Station calling?"
BA 2234 "Rhine this is Boffo 2234, PAN PAN PAN"
ATC. "Boffo 2234, pass your message"
BA 2234 "Rhine, this is Boffo 2234, PAN PAN PAN"
ATC, "Boffo 2234, say again?"
BA2234 "Rhine, this is a PAN call from Boffo 2234"
(at this point you can almost hear the Boffo skiper thinking "bloody
foreigners"
ATC, "Boffo 2234, are you declaring an emergency?"
BA2234 "Negative Rhine, Boffo 2234 is making a PAN call"
ATC, -silence-
BA 2234, Rhine, we have a pasenger having a heart attack, we're mkaing a
PAN call"
ATC, "Boffo 2234, do you wish to declare an emergency?"
BA 2234 "Nega- Oh, yes, yes, we're declaring an emergency, we'd like to
divert to Frankfurt immediatly. "
ATC, roger 2234, fly heading 330 and descend now to FL 150"

No ****, this really happened. I think it actually took longer than
this. The Brit captain just wouldn't let go....

The PAN actually sounds to me like a good idea, but as I always say I'm
still a lowly stude! Being able to differentiate between a Mayday (basically
aircraft in imminent danger) and PAN (something that needs priority but
nothing that will endanger the aircraft in short order) seems like a good
idea to me.

Anyway, the formt of his PAN PAN call was all wrong according to CAP 413

That's my current bug-bear actually. The only exam I've got left to do
(apart from the Skills test) is the R/T practical. On this, unless you're
word perfect on the Mayday call you've failed, but what are the odds of a
controller ignoring your mayday because you forgot (for example) your pilot
qualifications in the mayday call?

Andy