"Somebody check your mike on the radio, please..."

If I hear this ONE more time on Unicom, I'm going to scream!

Is it *really* possible that one can be a certificated pilot, and *NOT*
know that it's impossible to receive AND transmit at the same time?

Is it *really* possible that a certicated pilot would transmit a
statement like this into the ether, expecting the guy with the stuck
mike to actually be able to HEAR what he's saying?

Sadly, the answer is "yes". We hear it almost every time there's a
stuck-mike situation.

Truly scary...

I'll take a hundred guys saying "Any other traffic, please advise..."
over THIS kind of stupidity.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Is it *really* possible that a certicated pilot would transmit a
statement like this into the ether, expecting the guy with the stuck
mike to actually be able to HEAR what he's saying?

There are actually a few situations in which the aircraft with a stuck
mike might hear the transmissions. Granted they are not common, but
they are neither impossible nor contrived.

Jose
--
He who laughs, lasts.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

"Jose" wrote in message
...
Is it *really* possible that a certicated pilot would transmit a
statement like this into the ether, expecting the guy with the stuck
mike to actually be able to HEAR what he's saying?

There are actually a few situations in which the aircraft with a stuck
mike might hear the transmissions. Granted they are not common, but
they are neither impossible nor contrived.

And on a Unicom frequency those would be what?

Jose
--
He who laughs, lasts.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

On Sat, 19 Nov 2005 22:32:57 GMT, Dave Stadt wrote:

There are actually a few situations in which the aircraft with a stuck
mike might hear the transmissions. Granted they are not common, but
they are neither impossible nor contrived.

And on a Unicom frequency those would be what?

Lets expand this a tad further..... any frequency.

The absolute time I could ever think that someone heard that they had a
stuck mike would be if they were listening in on a handheld radio,
otherwise, I cannot think of any situations.

Allen

hmmm... what I had in mind was a split (pilot/copilot) stack, but upon
further thought the transmitter would overwhelm the receiver, even
though the receiver is not switched off.

As Rosanne RosannaDanna would say, "never mind".

Jose
(Damn... that's the =second= time I was wrong!)
--
He who laughs, lasts.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
ups.com...
If I hear this ONE more time on Unicom, I'm going to scream!

Is it *really* possible that one can be a certificated pilot, and *NOT*
know that it's impossible to receive AND transmit at the same time?


I've actually wondered about stuck mics. With the thousands of ancient GA
aircrafts flying in this country, I would think a mecahnical failure on the
PTT switch would not be very unlikely. If somebody's mic gets stuck on a
class B frequency (either the pilots fault or the mic breaking), would'nt
that be a big problem? How would they even track it?

"Jose" wrote in message
. ..
hmmm... what I had in mind was a split (pilot/copilot) stack, but upon
further thought the transmitter would overwhelm the receiver, even though
the receiver is not switched off.

As Rosanne RosannaDanna would say, "never mind".

Jose
(Damn... that's the =second= time I was wrong!)
--
He who laughs, lasts.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

How about in a dual com situation, tx on com1 and rec on com2?

Harvey

"Harvey" wrote in message
. ..
How about in a dual com situation, tx on com1 and rec on com2?

I believe Jose's (revised ) observation still holds. If COM1 is
transmitting, and COM2 will receive the most powerful transmitter, then in
the case of the airplane transmitting that would be COM1, not someone else
telling them to unstick their mic.

And in fact, that's the only reasonable interpretation of what Jose wrote,
since the only receiver available to receive when the transmitter on one is
stuck is the other. Reception is automatically disabled when transmitting
for the transmitting radio, so it wouldn't receive the other pilot's
transmission in any case. (All this assumes exactly two radios, of
course...a common enough configuration).

Pete

"Jacob" wrote in message
. com...
I've actually wondered about stuck mics. With the thousands of ancient GA
aircrafts flying in this country, I would think a mecahnical failure on
the PTT switch would not be very unlikely.

It does happen, yes.

If somebody's mic gets stuck on a class B frequency (either the pilots
fault or the mic breaking), would'nt that be a big problem? How would they
even track it?

It could be a problem. For the airplane with the stuck mic, it is
definitely a problem, since it effectively disables communication for that
airplane. For other users of the frequency, it just depends on how close
they are to each other and to the airplane with the stuck mic, and of course
the relative power of their transmitters. Many of the other users may still
be able to communicate with each other, at least in limited fashion, while
some may not.

I believe this would be a bigger problem at an uncontrolled airport, where
the users of the frequency are all very close to each other. In Class B
airspace, I can easily imagine situations in which the aircraft with the
stuck mic is far enough away from other aircraft that other transmissions
can get through to those other aircraft.

But yes, even in Class B airspace a stuck mic can be a big problem. I don't
know what you mean by "track it"; ATC would probably notice that they were
constantly receiving, and so would understand there's a stuck mic out there
somewhere. As for identifying the aircraft with the stuck mic, that might
be harder.

Theoretically, one could use direction finding equipment, but I doubt that's
practical in most cases; I think the DF information obtained through the FSS
would have to be correlated with radar data somehow, and I don't know how
well -- if at all -- those systems are linked. It could come down to
old-fashioned process of elimination; figuring out which aircraft can still
communicate, and eventually whittling the number of aircraft that can't
communicate down to one.

Pete

Peter Duniho wrote:

Theoretically, one could use direction finding equipment, but I doubt that's
practical in most cases; I think the DF information obtained through the FSS
would have to be correlated with radar data somehow, and I don't know how
well -- if at all -- those systems are linked. It could come down to
old-fashioned process of elimination; figuring out which aircraft can still
communicate, and eventually whittling the number of aircraft that can't
communicate down to one.

When the local FBO does it, I call them on the phone...

So nobody has ever froze and held the button down during a landing?