English is the international language of aviation, and the International Civil Aviation Organization requires all pilots and air traffic controllers to be competent in English. Some of the tests that have been developed to ensure that they have the appropriate levels of this very distinctive 'domain specific' English are listed below.

The English that is spoken in communication between pilots and air traffic control is quite restricted, and is referred to as standard phraseology. A largely fixed set of words and phrases is used to cover most operating procedures and eventualities. This is explained in detail in Franz Rubenbauer's book Linguistics and Flight Safety: Aspects of oral English communication in aviation, which is available from his website.

You might expect that miscommunication would be rare when people are working with a very restricted code. But this is not the case. One of the most frequent problems is caused by pronunciation when speaking over poor radio connections, but grammatical and lexical problems are not unusual either. If anything out of the ordinary happens misunderstandings can be compounded by intercultural communication problems and lack of flexibility in language use.

For Discussion

1. Make a list of possible consequences of miscommunication in air traffic communication.
2. Do you think that all pilots and air traffic controllers should be required to demonstrate an adequate competency in English?
3. How might you go about defining "adequate" in this context?
4. Look at the tests of avation English (links below). What are the key features of these tests? What evidence is presented to suggest that a particular test is useful for the intended decision?
5. Open Live Air Traffic Control, select an airport, and listen to the air traffic communication for a short while. What do you think are the challenges of comprehending instructions through radiotelephony?
6. Look at the links on the right side of this web page. Choose one that looks interesting to you. What issues does it raise for the training and testing of aviation personnel?
7. Open your favourite search engine and type in 'learn aviation English'. Select one course. Who is the course targetted at? Do you think it would meet their needs?

Latest Aviation Language News

Websites

• Aviation English and Assessment
• Aviation Communication: Linguistic Factors
• ELPAC Test for Controllers
• RMIT English Language Test for Aviation (RELTA)
• Test of English for Aviation
• Versant for Aviation
• TELLCAP

Publications

• Assessing English Language Proficiency in International Aviation: Issues of Reliability, Validity, and Aviation Safety
• Air Safety, Language Assessment Policy, and Policy Implementation: The Case of Aviation English
• A Survey of Aviation English Tests
• Language Testing Criteria for Global Harmonization in Civil Aviation