In rec.aviation.student WingFlaps wrote:
Technical comment :

Is there anyone here who thinks velocity is not used by pilots as a
vector (apart from Stefan)? I say the common parlance for the
magnitude of velocity is SPEED that is why you have an ASI in your
plane and a speedometer in your car. Anyone disagree?

I suggest that we are in a piloting forum, a technical environment,
and pilots do know the difference, e.g. they understand and use basic
physics and vector addition all the time... But I could be wrong and
if so I apologize for using technical terms correctly.

I have never heard the term "velocity" used to explicitly indicate speed
and direction outside of a physics classroom. The pilots I talk to almost
never use the word at all. Stefan is absolutely correct that in
non-technical discussion the word is synonymous with speed. Until Stefan
mentioned that he was not a native English speaker I would not have
guessed.

I'd also like to suggest that from my point of view your reaction to the
confusion was *way* out of line. The correct response is simply to note
that you are using "velocity" in its technical sense as a vector and not
its lay sense as a synonym for speed, then continue the discussion from
there. Berating him for bad English is simply uncalled for, although it is
of course par for the course on Usenet.

--
Michael Ash
Rogue Amoeba Software