even the pros dont get it right

B. Jensen wrote:

Until you flown in Europe and experienced "their different way"
(especially France) of doing things, don't be too hard on a US carrier
that just spent 8+ hours enroute to Europe in an old "steam gauge"
airliner. ;-)

Actually, yes, I am so hard. I expect from an ATP to know the rules of
the air he is flying in. I expect his employer to offer appropriate
training. I expect the pilot to prepare his flight.

On the other hand, everybody is making mistakes, of course.

Stefan

Stefan wrote:

Actually, yes, I am so hard. I expect from an ATP to know the rules of
the air he is flying in. I expect his employer to offer appropriate
training. I expect the pilot to prepare his flight.

And I expect a surgeon with a Ph.D. in medicine and years of training to
be flawless too, however, we both know that isn't always the case. (sigh)

On the other hand, everybody is making mistakes, of course.

Yep...it's called being human. (double sigh)

BJ

"Stefan" wrote in message news:d6asj8

Actually, yes, I am so hard. I expect from an ATP to know the rules of the
air he is flying in. I expect his employer to offer appropriate training.
I expect the pilot to prepare his flight.

Knowing the rules, with appropriate training, and prepared for the flight,
verbal slips will still occur. Having flown transports in *exactly* the
environment you described - [have you, Stefan? ] - , I would be willing to
guarantee a very high probability that what you heard was merely a slip of
the tongue. Happens all the time, and controllers on both sides of the
ocean are well cognizant of this. You ought to take a lead from the
controller's attitude. Bear in mind also that climbing to FL150 and
climbing to 15000 ft aren't all that different.

Let the NG know the first time *you* make a low grade error. Enquiring
minds.....

John Gaquin wrote:

Knowing the rules, with appropriate training, and prepared for the flight,
verbal slips will still occur.

Of course. And I've made mistakes myself which I'm glad nobody knows of.

I jumped at this thread when a poster or two pointed out that the pilot
was probably American, implying, as I understood (my interpretation),
that he is therefore excused to have "forgotten" that there were
different traffic rules in the airspace he flew in. All I wanted to
point is that this is no excuse. Maybe I wasn't clear enough.

Bear in mind also that climbing to FL150 and
climbing to 15000 ft aren't all that different.

It may be the difference between an uneventful flight and a midair,
especially when climbing to one altitude involves crossing the other.
Climbing or descending beyond the cleared altitude is one of the more
frequent causes of near miss reports.

Stefan

"Stefan" wrote in message
...
John Gaquin wrote:

Knowing the rules, with appropriate training, and prepared for the
flight, verbal slips will still occur.

Of course. And I've made mistakes myself which I'm glad nobody knows of.

I jumped at this thread when a poster or two pointed out that the pilot
was probably American, implying, as I understood (my interpretation), that
he is therefore excused to have "forgotten" that there were different
traffic rules in the airspace he flew in. All I wanted to point is that
this is no excuse. Maybe I wasn't clear enough.

Bear in mind also that climbing to FL150 and climbing to 15000 ft aren't
all that different.

It may be the difference between an uneventful flight and a midair,
especially when climbing to one altitude involves crossing the other.
Climbing or descending beyond the cleared altitude is one of the more
frequent causes of near miss reports.

I would echo that. It is perfectly possible that being at 15000 instead of
FL150 would give you the height difference that would put you outside the
deviation limit.

However as the OP the point of the post was to demonstrate that pilots and
ATC work as a team, not as adversaries aiming to score points of each other.

For another thought on the matter lets just imagine there was an incident
and the tape was being played later. If ATC had not said what they did, the
pilots would have been left in the prime seat for any blame because they got
it wrong. Any excuse the blame the pilot would have been taken by those with
a reason to shift the blame.
ATC caught the issue and although it was minor, it was straighten out with
an "affirm" from the pilots. Therefore the original wrong call ceases to be
a factor.
I call that great teamwork.
For what its worth, the correct response was "affirm" not "affirmative".
Extra brownie points for that. The reason is to draw a clear distinction
from "negative".

If transmissions get clipped at the start of the word, then affirmative and
negative risk sounding the same.

Stefan wrote:

I jumped at this thread when a poster or two pointed out that the
pilot was probably American, implying, as I understood (my
interpretation), that he is therefore excused to have "forgotten" that
there were different traffic rules in the airspace he flew in. All I
wanted to point is that this is no excuse. Maybe I wasn't clear enough.

The assumption was that the pilot was American based on the "NW43"
callsign and reference to a DC10. I agree that pilots should always
know the rules for the airspace they are flying in, above or under.

BTW, are you from Sweden or France?

BJ