Southwest Airline Pilot rants, unknowingly
 

Language is most definitely Not Safe For Work.

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open mikes suck

Situational awareness training will be a major focus during SVT events At Southwest begininng today with emphasis on proper interphone & radio proceedures. This kinda cockpit chatter has & will go on worldwide with every carrier from every country in every language. If ya could freeze every CVR at this very moment in time and play back the last thirty minutes on each one, a lotta the conversations would sound about the same as this "red face" rant. Sad but true. I'm sure there is going to be at least one job opening at Southwest.

I've had a stuck mic while talking to ATL approach years ago. I didn't say anything that bad thank goodness, but I still remember that day like it happened yesterday!

Anyone that has spent any time in cockpits has probably had a stuck mike at some point. Fortunately, most people [most....] are professional enough on the job that all you hear is the magazine page turn, the occasional click as the VOR's are adjusted, and of course, the occasional fart.


:p


The FAR's specifically talk about non-essential conversation in the cockpit, and this does include above 10,000 feet. What's more, company FOM's, which are regulatory under part 121, usually specifically address this sort of thing. The reality is that some chatter in the cockpit actually helps keep people awake and on their toes in my opinion. Generally, in my experience the talk revolves around sports, the occasional chat about cars/boats/planes, but mainly gripes about the lack of management talent at the company. These guys at Southwest really went overboard! They don't sound like professionals any more, they sound like drunken frat boys.

No wonder we have such a bad rep-

N

What activates the mic? Button on the control stick? Voice operated? How does it stick open?

depends...some planes have multiple ways of keying the mike. IE: button on the glareshield, switch on the yolk (with a method of latching it down), etc. we usually used the glareshield button, to make sure that we didnt accidentally lock down the yolk switch.

Some really interesting stories are shared in the cockpit, most not ready for prime time.
Only once in 25 years of jump seat/cockpit rides did a pilot advise me before push back no talking below 10,000 feet.

Years ago I was working ground control freq at San Diego Airport while two flight attendants in an empty cockpit/open mic compared periods for 15 minutes.
I had to listen as I switched all my traffic to an unblocked freq.
That was nasty. http://forums.pelicanparts.com/support/smileys/puke.gif

It works the other way too. Colleague of mine (UAC) put her purse on the footswitch prior to embarking into a full scale rant about another colleague. Took about 5 minutes before we realized it got awfully quiet on the freq.

No pilots piped in with "was I married to you once?" ;)

Any idiot that was aware of the surroundings would have realized that there was no incoming radio traffic........besides not being PC, he was derelict is his duties.

The funniest part was the Skywest pilot, "uh, that was not us..."

He, he. No but one afterwards said " You really don't seem to like Bernd". The worst (or funniest) part is that this a very normal, well educated and friendly woman, just the one time she let herself completely go, she was broadcasting to the world. :)

There's a good Far Side cartoon similar to this somewhere.

I worked with some hot head controllers...
If one of them started to get vocal I would select a recorded line/"brief" button.
Just to let the distraction know he was being recorded.
Didn't solve the problem but it got them to be quiet so we could get back to work. :)

SIMPLE!!! He is just the one that got caught with the open mike!!