Free writing about aviation communication

       “PAN-PAN-PAN”, an urgency signal from French word—“Panne”, which originally means a breakdown or a mechanical failure. In aviation communication, this signal means “pay attention now” and “possible assistance needed”. It will be called by the pilot in the public frequency when something is tending to go wrong and they may need assistance and response by others such as require a specific altitude level or fly route. The urgency level of “PAN-PAN-PAN” is lower than “Mayday”, which is the most emergency call in the air.  

When “Mayday-Mayday” is called by pilots, it’s a signal that they are declaring into a extremely emergency situation, such as serious mechanical failures, running out of fuel or fire and smoke in the aircraft. In this case, a emergency frequency will be set up immediately or ATC will ask for a radio silence to communicate with the plane in emergency, asking about what’s the problem and what they needed. At the same time, all other flights in the same area must give a way to them by following the further order by ATC unconditionally until the emergency is gone. 

For example, I’ve watched a video that an American airplane flied into a storm accidentally but the pilot didn’t lose control and they were trying to get out of it. In this case, they need to make a quick change of their flying direction and altitude to fly out of the storm. Because the airplane wan’t out of control and they thought they still can handle the situation (of course they did), they estimated the situation and called “PAN-PAN-PAN” in the public frequency to ask other pilots for more information and assistance. 

One thing to be mentioned, when we talk about aviation English, it doesn’t only refer to the communication between ATCs and pilots, it also included the communication between captain and first-officer in the cockpit when two pilots come form different culture and speak different languages. I believe this case may not exist in the U.S. but as for as I knew, countries like China has many foreign pilots who cooperate with domestic pilots everyday in the air. The cross-culture communication, which could lead to misunderstanding, uncomfortable or even serious accidents, also exist inside a small cockpit although all pilots are trained to communicate with each other effectively. There was a very serious accident in Shanghai, China, 2011. An intercontinental flight form Qatar was running out of fuel due to diversion and waiting for landing in air. The pilot called “Mayday” when roughly 15-mins fuel left when still waiting, the ATC handled the situation perfectly by asking all other planes clear the approaching route for this Qatar’s flight almost immediately. But there was a Chinese domestic flight which flied by a Korean captain and a Chinese co-pilot refused to give a way to Qatar’s flight while they already had declared into a emergency status. In despair, the only thing ATC can do was asking that Qatar’s flight to do another round and land after that Chinese flight who refused to give up their approach. After an emergency landing process, the Qatar plane only left about 5-mins fuel when they finally got on the ground. While that Chinese flight still left about an hour. ATC was using “xxxx, there is a MAYDAY flight right behind you, turn left and heading to xxx, immediately! ”,“Immediately!” And “xxxx, turn left! immediately!” After this accident both pilot who was in charged for that Chinese flight was suspended from they duties immediately and may face a serious of accuses on the court. Later the report said, due to poor communication, executive and cooperate capacity, those two pilot of the Chinese flight failed to make a right decision and agreement in the crucial moment, very fortunately it didn’t cause emergency landing or plane crash, but it was just so close.