A friend posted this on Facebook, I thought fellow EuroGA members would be interested:
All flight crew who operate in France, the French authorities are looking at increasing the amount of french they use at major airports. Without getting into the whole argument that English people should learn extra languages etc, they are running a survey but it is only open for a very short time (e.g. it must be completed today).
Please, if you fly in France and want your say on if English should remain the language of choice for flight safety reasons please complete the following short survey (18 questions, takes 3 minutes)
http://enqueteur.stac.developpement-durable.gouv.fr/index.php?sid=12599&lang=en
Done in favour of English for safety reasons – though I like the French language very much …
Done it.
Done thanks for brining to our attention.
Done
Done. Having lived and flown in a country (Spain in this case) that uses two languages in aviation I am very, very aware of the risks and loss of SA. I say that, despite being fluent in Spanish and have no problem doing the r/t in Spanish. However, you could often literally hear the gears grind in the controller’s head when having to switch languages repeatedly. It’s a recipe for disaster.
uses two languages in aviation I am very, very aware of the risks and loss of SA.
I second that and also the comment about the controllers head grinding gears. The whole language topic is getting very emotive and difficult to navigate.
For example, Germany, where I fly mainly, has introduced German only airfields in the last few years, and a fine of up to between 25k€ and 40k€, depending who you ask, if you have an incident without a German language endorsement on your licence, at one of these fields. However, until last year there was no where you could get a German language proficiency level… You can now. But the UK CAA won’t endorse a UK issued licence… So even if I got my level 4 or level 5, how do I endorse the licence…?
I do think we should make an effort to learn languages when we go abroad. But if they could agree some standard phrases for small VFR fields… We only really need to understand the following words and phrases:
Numbers 1 to 10
Airfield information for departure
Airfield information for landing
Runway
Qnh (if it is termed differently)
Downwind
Base
Final
Go around
X persons on board
If that was on a crib sheet I could learn it quickly and use the local language. Because when it doubt just get out of the pattern and come back in for another go, if it’s busy and you lose the picture. You won’t hit anything doing a 90 degree turn away from the airport.
But at a larger airfield, with high traffic volume a single language should be used for flight safety. At the moment it’s English, due to historic events… Anyone think we should start learning Chinese?
Done
172driver wrote:
you could often literally hear the gears grind in the controller’s head when having to switch languages repeatedly. It’s a recipe for disaster.
With respect, I don’t think that the controller’s head is the problem. The issue lies in local language pilots not understanding the anglophone conversations and vice versa.
I speak conversational French and many times I have heard conversations in French that have made my ears prick up and change my situational awareness. Parachute drops through controlled airspace for example.
Even worse is when you are IFR at a level and a francophone pilot is being climbed through your level, or stopped below your level.
It’s an accident waiting to happen and, while I have every sympathy with the loss of sovereignty experienced when a local controller has to speak to a local pilot in a foreign language (wars have been fought over less), one day a whole load of people will die in an Überlingen-like misunderstanding.
The French, Spanish and Russians won’t do it, but somehow Germany, Scandinavia etc manage.
(What I really mean is that we are seeing the cladding taken off only after the most appalling fire killing 80 people, surely it is clear that we should get rid of this obvious accident ready to happen before two A380s collide in another Tenerife or Überlingen accident.)
