How To Talk To Air Traffic Control | ATC Radio Basics for Pilots

in this video we're talking about one of the most intimidating things that student pilots face talking to air traffic control hey dear valley ground i'm a cessna how not to make a fool of yourself coming up this video is brought to you by plain english one of the best ways to learn radio communications online or on your mobile device using their aviation radio simulator specializing in vfr and ifr communications plain english offers a fun pressure free way to get you ready to take control of the comms more information in the description and remember to use our code fwtg to get a discount on your subscription if you're a student pilot pilot who doesn't fly at controlled fields or simply just rusting on the comms talking to air traffic control can be intimidating and the fear of messing up being corrected or not understanding what atc just said can take the fun out of flying but despite your fears realize that atc is there to help keep everyone safe and can be just as stressed as you are bottom line the faa requires certain communications to happen on the radio and that puts pressures on the controller so they have to put pressure on the pilots to make sure that everyone is in compliance so let's break communications down into things that are a little more simple easier to manage in radio communications there's three parts the request instructions and confirmation so you make a request to air traffic control they give you instructions and you repeat the instructions to confirm that you heard them correctly then unless you've been asked to report back or you have a new request you only receive and confirm updated instructions from air traffic control that's it that's literally all radio communication is but because what you say and how you say it matters we're gonna dig in a little deeper by walking you guys through a flight now this is going to be a generic flight it's going to be edited for basic radio communications and again detailed communications for different types of airspace can be found down in the description now at a controlled field there's usually multiple controllers each with a specific job in our scenario there are two ground control to control the taxiways and tower to control the runways and airspace now you always need permission to enter taxiways and runways and even when moving in between them unless you're otherwise directed so today we're starting our flight over at the hangers and the first thing we need to do is get the adas report which includes weather and airport information deer valley airport information echo we made a whole video on the atus report and there's a link for that down in the description but we need to let ground control know we have it using a unique identifier and once we have that we move the plane over to the movement area boundary and contact ground for permission to taxi dear valley ground cessna 75600 romeo 8 requesting taxi northwest departure with echo that initial call may have sounded complicated so let's break it down into what we call the 5ws who you're talking to who you are where you are what is your request and intentions and with what information so we always have to start with who we're talking to in case we happen to be on the wrong frequency then we tell them who we are using our aircraft type and tail number also known as a call sign then where you are so they can find you on the airfield then we give them what our request is along with our intentions and last we let them know we've listened to the adais report by giving them its identifier not as bad when you break it down but this is everything ground control needs to give you your instructions now the ws they aren't the end all in communications they're just a good technique to use in fact the order of where you are what you are what your intentions are don't really matter but by using the w's communications just flow better and feel more natural anyways with initial contact out of the way now you just have to listen to what ground control tells you and confirm it so they know you heard them like this that's ns75600 runway seven left two by alpha alpha four taxing via alpha to alpha four runway seven left six zero zero it's really that easy just listen confirm your instructions and make sure you close with your tail number that last part being really important without it they don't know who just confirmed the instructions no big deal if you forget they'll just make you say everything again with your tail number also when ground control gave me my instructions they use the first two w's too that's because it lets everyone know who they are who they're talking to that's important because typically they will respond to you right away but if they're busy and need to give another aircraft more pressing instructions they may talk to them before they respond to you and quick fact the first two w's are always used when making initial contact broadcasting on unicom and on other air-to-air frequencies now for me the instructions were easy to follow because there's really only one way to get to the runway but at a more complex airport this can be rather intimidating like if you're at prescott arizona parked here at the hangers and you were told to taxi to this runway here your instructions could get complicated no big deal tower is there to help you just request a progressive taxi and they'll give you instructions just like a gps in your car then you just have to confirm smaller portions of their instructions as they update you now back to my taxi i made it down to the end of the runway and i'm ready to take off but this boundary in front of me means i need to contact someone for clearance to enter it ground control has gotten me this far but the runway is controlled by tower so i change over to their frequency and believe it or not make initial contact again because now i'm talking to a different controller deer valley tower cessna 75600 holding shorts seven left ready for departure this time i didn't use all five w's i used the first three and kind of the fourth for that one i just told them that i was ready for departure this is because of how air traffic control operates in the tower my information was handed from ground control to tower so they already knew what i wanted i just needed to let them know that i was ready to go then once everything is clear 75600 tower why shootout runway seven months clear for takeoff fly straight out runway seven left cleared for takeoff six zero zero once i confirm the call i can pull onto the runway and take off but back up for a moment from this point air traffic control could have given me all kinds of instructions i usually get a hold short the runway so that they can make sure it's safe for me to part then sometimes i'll get a line up and wait if a plane just landed and they wanted me to be on the runway ready to go as soon as the other plane's off of it but usually i get cleared for takeoff and there are a couple of other things they could tell me along with that like fly straight out here you need to depart the airport in line with the runway correcting for crosswinds fly runway heading this one means to depart the airport on the same heading as the runway without correcting for wind i'll call your crosswind this is when there's other inbound aircraft and they're trying to create spacing for it right or left turn approved with this you can turn when you're at a safe altitude but it also follows a straight out or runway-heading departure when it's safe for you to make your turn right or left close traffic approved you'll get this if you're approved to stay in the pattern for touch and goes okay back to the flying part as i fly away i'll only hear from air traffic control when they need to update my instructions or alert me to something like this after i took northwestbound is off northwestbound proof 600. in each situation you would just confirm and comply but this means that you need to be listening for your call sign as long as you're in their airspace which brings me to abbreviated call signs air traffic control may contact you using your aircraft type and the last three numbers of your tail they usually do this to help speed up communications and you can do it too you just have to wait until they do it first because there could be someone else with a similar tail number in which case they'll keep using your full call sign this just means that you need to be listening for both signs even when the radios are non-stop in the background two three whiskey the cessna ahead of you is in left-close traffic outside of them you're left out when a departure to the west is approved traffic inside outside that traffic left downward departure westbound approved alpha player for fostering that's not wanted alpha that's affirmative closed traffic is approved that's close traffic update there's a six zero zero frequency change frequency change approved six zero zero thank you okay that's basically it for departure so let's move on to arrivals we've been going through a lot of the ins and outs already so this should be a lot faster but it all starts with making initial contact with air traffic control for clearance into the airspace using the 5ws deer valley tower cessna 75600 over the shooting range inbound requesting full stop with information echo even though we're inside of the air the information we have to provide is still the same for the third w we're telling them where we're at so that they can find us on their screen for this you can use reporting points on the sectional or well-known locations from your area like the shooting range in my case but once air traffic control replies with your call sign and gives you instructions which establishes two-way radio communications i just need to confirm and comply with it i turn the left base for runway seven left left base runway seven left six zero zero now i was about ten miles out when i made this call and all air traffic controllers required to do at this point is let me know which runway is in use and the traffic pattern for it by saying make right or left traffic for runway well i mean you get the idea but they could have told me any number of things to do like report when i'm closer to the airport alert me to traffic that's close by or even tell me to remain to help out here are some other things that they can say follow traffic at your 12 o'clock i use 12 o'clock as an example here but you'll hear this when they want you to follow someone else in the pattern and they're telling you where to look if you see the traffic you would respond with traffic and sight if you don't you're supposed to say negative contact but a lot of pilots just say looking for traffic continue straight in you're already flying the runway heading and you can fly straight in and skip the pattern cross over midfield and make right or left traffic you're on the wrong side of the airport here so they're having you fly over midfield and telling you what direction to join the pattern extend your downwind i'll call your base here they're trying to make room for other aircraft just keep flying until they tell you to turn turn bass they want you to turn base right away clear to land this one is obvious but make sure you don't land unless you hear and confirm it the same rule applies for any type of landing touch and go stop and go short approach whatever it is last cleared for the option you have to request the option to be cleared for it but if you are you can do whatever type of landing you want back to my flight before i could actually join the pattern i was given clearance to land zero zero runway seven last cleanliness clear to land runway seven left six zero zero [Applause] since there was no one in front of me i was able to skip the pattern and fly directly into the base lake for landing pole perfect now after my landing tower will give us one last set of instructions and contact round control one two one point thank you tournament alpha six have a great day six zero zero after fully pulling off the runway and switching frequencies to ground control we can make our last call now it is an initial call because we switched to ground control so we'll have to use those w's again but we'll omit the last one because they don't care if we have the adore support to taxi to the hangars deer valley ground cessna 75600 alpha 6 requesting taxi to north hangers 75620 grand tax at north ramp alpha texas north ramp via alpha 6-0 well that was a lot of information but hopefully it can help you better understand the basics of radio communications at toward airports now before we end this one i wanted to give you guys a few tips first don't feel stupid everyone makes mistakes i still mess up on my call i messed up on a bunch today just roll with it and shake it off if it happens avoid using 2 and 4 next to important numbers in your transmission because they sound like numbers too use a single transmission on initial contact or when verifying new instructions if you miss something don't press the button again and just add to it if atc asks you to verify just say the whole thing over again speak at your own pace just because they talk fast doesn't mean that you need to and if they talk so fast that you can't understand them you can always ask them to say again or speak slower ask for help if you need it like if you can't find the traffic you're following ask air traffic control to call your base don't be afraid to use this one but if you're uncomfortable with their instructions or it would be unsafe for you to follow them say unable a good example if you were cleared to take off but there's someone on short and final last realize that air traffic controllers are human can make mistakes and have bad days so be kind helpful and throw them a thank you when you can alright that's it for now but make sure to check the description for the links to the other videos that we've made on flying into class dc and b airspace mastering the radios and how to understand what's going on in the airspace around you hey guys thanks for watching the video we hope that you enjoyed it and learned a little bit of something on the basics of talking to air traffic control we actually made a video like this a really long time ago and is about to hit a million views so we decided to remake it bigger better stronger all those things anyways you can check it out over our channel page if you want to and while you're there make sure to subscribe because we have a lot more follow-up videos to this one that we just made anyways share aviation wherever you can and we'll see in the next one

Channel: Fly With The Guys

Views: 592,264

Keywords: Private Pilot License, flying, flight, airplanes, flight training, airport, aviation, private pilot, pilot training, air traffic control, ATC communications, talking to ATC, ATC radio communications, atc radio procedures, atc, how to talk to atc, how to talk to air traffic control, aircraft radios, pilot, atc conversations, atc audio, atc explained, pilot radio communications, talk to air traffic control, atc communications, atc practice, vatsim, vatsim atc, pilotedge atc, pilotedge

Id: mcAn_elsWG0

Length: 14min 23sec (863 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 04 2021