Since AOPA’s home airport gained a control tower in May 2012, we’ve seen and heard just how well—or badly—our neighbors learned to operate in that environment. Some are crisp and professional, using standard radio phraseology and keeping the airport diagram handy to decipher taxi clearances. Others—well, this exchange one recent Friday afternoon was a good example. (We’ve changed the N-number to protect the guilty.)
“November Three-Seven-Tango, what are you doing, sir?”
“What am I doing? ... I’m going to 23.”
“I cleared you to taxi via Hotel, Delta, and Alpha, sir. You’re on taxiway Bravo.”
“But this is how I always...what?”
I don’t know whether this was a student who’d never learned to follow a clearance or an old-timer who’d forgotten, but not knowing how to read it back was the least of his problems. It took four radio exchanges to establish that he wanted to stay in the pattern; his request to take off from a runway perpendicular to the one in use was then denied. He acknowledged the instruction to report midfield downwind but never actually did it. Eventually the tower controller focused on keeping other aircraft out of his way.
The embarrassment of hearing a pilot who was in over his head before he ever called ground control was a reminder that the regulations are a floor, not a ceiling. To reach the checkride, private pilot candidates only need to make sure their 10 hours of solo flight include three full-stop circuits around the pattern at an airport with an operating control tower. Sport pilots aren’t required to log any experience with towered fields at all. But are students well served if they only get the minimum required training—then find themselves painfully out of their depth at the busiest airports they’ll ever use?
It’s not just a question of comfort. Fumbling on the frequency gums things up for everyone. Blown clearances lead to runway incursions and taxi conflicts that endanger others (especially at night). Even if it takes a long cross-country to reach the nearest towered field, you can drill your students until the procedures are second nature. No pilot should ever be afraid to talk to a controller.
David Jack Kenny is manager of aviation safety analysis for the Air Safety Institute.
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Since AOPA’s home airport gained a control tower in May 2012, we’ve seen and heard just how well—or badly—our neighbors learned to operate in that environment. Some are crisp and professional, using standard radio phraseology and keeping the airport diagram handy to decipher taxi clearances. Others—well, this exchange one recent Friday afternoon was a good example. (We’ve changed the N-number to protect the guilty.)
“November Three-Seven-Tango, what are you doing, sir?”
“What am I doing? ... I’m going to 23.”
“I cleared you to taxi via Hotel, Delta, and Alpha, sir. You’re on taxiway Bravo.”
“But this is how I always...what?”
I don’t know whether this was a student who’d never learned to follow a clearance or an old-timer who’d forgotten, but not knowing how to read it back was the least of his problems. It took four radio exchanges to establish that he wanted to stay in the pattern; his request to take off from a runway perpendicular to the one in use was then denied. He acknowledged the instruction to report midfield downwind but never actually did it. Eventually the tower controller focused on keeping other aircraft out of his way.
The embarrassment of hearing a pilot who was in over his head before he ever called ground control was a reminder that the regulations are a floor, not a ceiling. To reach the checkride, private pilot candidates only need to make sure their 10 hours of solo flight include three full-stop circuits around the pattern at an airport with an operating control tower. Sport pilots aren’t required to log any experience with towered fields at all. But are students well served if they only get the minimum required training—then find themselves painfully out of their depth at the busiest airports they’ll ever use?
It’s not just a question of comfort. Fumbling on the frequency gums things up for everyone. Blown clearances lead to runway incursions and taxi conflicts that endanger others (especially at night). Even if it takes a long cross-country to reach the nearest towered field, you can drill your students until the procedures are second nature. No pilot should ever be afraid to talk to a controller.
David Jack Kenny is manager of aviation safety analysis for the Air Safety Institute.