What is The Easy Route to Aviation Radio Proficiency about?
The dictum “Aviate, Navigate, Communicate” reminds pilots to keep their priorities straight: fly the airplane first. But good communication—called radiotelephony in aviation—is an essential aspect of flying safety, and for many it’s the most daunting, especially for students and low-time pilots. In many ways, learning radiotelephony is like learning a new language (even if it is, technically, English). The good news is that mastering communications as a pilot is easier than you might expect—and even, believe it or not, fun—with the right tools and opportunities to practice.
You’re holding in your hands right now one of those tools, a companion manual to our popular PlaneEnglish Aviation Radio Simulator (ARSim).
This manual focuses on the radio communications you are likely to encounter under Visual Flight Rules (VFR) conditions. It is designed to teach you aviation phraseology and guide you through the PlaneEnglish ARSim to practice what you learn. When you are learning communications, it may feel a lot like rote memorization. But this manual encourages you to learn the meaning behind what you’re saying. In other words, what are you accomplishing through a transmission? What information are you sharing with Air Traffic Control (ATC)? And what information is ATC giving you?
Of course, practice makes perfect, and the more time you spend outside of the aircraft building and testing your skills, the more effective you’ll be in the cockpit (and the more money you’ll save on flight training). In addition to learning aviation phraseology, the Aviation Radio Simulator introduces you to the phases of flight by giving you a tool to practice talking to all the ATC facilities, from Ground Control to Tower, Departure, Approach, etc. A successful flight relies on you and ATC sharing very specific technical information using a very specific technical language. This manual will help you understand what you are talking about and how to say it correctly.
Together, the ARSim and this manual offer powerfully effective and engaging tools for student pilots, and the instructors and flight schools that train them. Used in conjunction with ground school and in-flight training, they offer instructors in particular a wealth of information and scenarios that support both pre-teaching and practicing radio communications. As an instructor, you can direct students to read the manual section and practice the accompanying communications before a flight and offer students to practice the communications of specific phases in which their skills remain weak. You can also assign ARSim as homework and require the reading of the manual and practice sessions in the app. As a student, of course, you can return to the manual and app again and again.
Wherever you are along your flying adventure, we wish you blue skies. Stay Sharp on the Mic!