PP #36 – Shelter-In-Place Special Edition n°6
Practice 08/05/2020
Shelter-In-Place Special Editions n°1 to 5 followed the chronological development of a flight.
In this process, the main topics covered were: radio operations, airports, taxiing, take-off, airspace, and flight information.
Shelter-In-Place Special Edition n°6 will end this six-week journey by going over
navigation and landing.
Review vocabulary on navigation and phraseology on landing with these two double pages from L’Anglais pour voler:
PHRASEOLOGY – Aerodrome traffic circuit, landing
Then practice with a crossword.
For a recap, follow the chronological stages of a flight from departure to arrival with this listening comprehension exercise:
ATIS, departure, flight information, arrival
With an additional fun quest: find the typo in the text!
Oshkosh, the legendary fly-in held every year in July in the US, has been cancelled this year because of the pandemic. Revisit the 2018 event and listen to an awesome arrival sequence:
The links are still relevant, although Fraser MacPhee’s comment mentioned in the www.boldmethod.com paragraph is nowhere to be found.
www.pilotworkshop.com’s pilot-friendly briefing guide.
Taxi, take-off, landing, … and more
Something a pilot needs to land is … a landing gear! Below is a digest of what can happen when its reliability is questionable:
The closing exercise is another full FCL.055 exam, for a last round of checkups. Practice with a fictional flight, an unusual situation, and a listening comprehension test. Read carefully the instructions, several times if needed, for each exercise. You’ll also find a complete presentation of the exam in PP #31 Shelter-In-Place Special Edition n°1’s seventh exercise .
– Fictional flight
scenario and audio file:
– Unusual situation
– listening comprehension
listen to the recording below and find the missing words in the text:
PP #35 – Shelter-In-Place Special Edition n°5
Practice 01/05/2020
Shelter-In-Place Special Editions n°1 to 4 took you gradually up into the air.
Now that you have taken off, what topics come next?
Airspace and flight information!
Get in the mood with a short refresher on airspace classification and airspace infringement:
Know your airspace, don’t become an infringement statistic
Read more on the subject of airspace infringement here. Scroll down the page to find a useful guide if you plan a flight in the UK : The Skyway Code
From L’Anglais pour voler, two double-pages worth of vocabulary:
PHRASEOLOGY – Flight Information Service
Check the pronunciation of some of the words:In-flight landmarks.
And practice with a crossword.
This first listening comprehension exercise will include some revisions on airport operations:
Airspace, airports, movement area
(1) : The ATIS phone numbers for the UK’s airports are listed p.32 of the GetMet leaflet available on the Met Office site. Scroll down the « Aeronautical meteorology – service for low-level aviation » paragraph to the last entry: Training resources for pilots and GETMET.
Another listening comprehension exercise, this time showing how significant flight information can be for a pilot:
This listening comprehension exercise focuses on traffic information:
At the end of the 5th week of intensive practice, it is time for a full FCL.055 exam, with one excercise for each of the three tests.
If needed, go back to PP #31 Shelter-In-Place Special Edition n°1, Thursday April 7th, for a complete presentation of the exam.
PP #34 – Shelter-In-Place Special Edition n°4
Practice 24/04/2020
Special Edition n°1 dealt with basic words, n°2 was about radio operations, and n°3 tackled airports and taxiing.
With Special Edition n°4, let’s go a step further in the chronology of a flight, and work on runways and take-off.
Some light reading to start with, review a few basic facts, and reflect on runway excursions and incursions:
Runways, are they really dangerous places to be?
From L’Anglais pour voler, study these two double-pages:
AIRPORTS – The manoeuvering area
PHRASEOLOGY – Aerodrome, take-off
Check the pronunciation of some of the words here
Now for some listening comprehension:
Back to ATIS and numbers, with some more listening comprehension practice:
More reading about what you are NOT supposed to find around an aircraft:
FOD, encounters of a dubious kind
Also on the subject of FOD:
End of week 4. It’s time for the already traditional FCL.055 VFR exam listening comprehension test:
Get ready for the new flying season
PP #33 – Shelter-In-Place Special Edition n°3
Practice 17/04/2020
Review the vocabulary associated with airports,
and phraseology related to the phases of flight preceding take-off: ground operations and taxiing.
To warm up your brain and switch it into English mode, read this article from Kiddle, Wikipedia’s offspring made for children.
Learning from children’s programs is a great way to go back to basics.
Scroll all the way down the article, to read the pictures’ caption and review a lot of vocabulary, as you would in a visual dictionary.
From L’Anglais pour voler, study these two double-pages on ground operations:
PHRASEOLOGY – Aerodrome, on the ground
And practice with a crossword.
Taxiing is not as easy as it sounds:
Taxiing around an airport, an orienteering exercise
Numbers, again … but this time with letters!
Remember that the ATIS phone numbers for the UK’s airports are listed p.32 of the GetMet leaflet available on the Met Office site.
Scroll down the » Aeronautical meteorology – service for low-level aviation « paragraph to the last entry: Training resources for pilots and GETMET.
What happens when something goes wrong:
Celebrate the end of the third week of intensive English training with another FCL.055 listening comprehension test.
Practice 1
Practice 2
PP #32 – Shelter-In-Place Special Edition n°2
Practice 10/04/2020
Eliot is doing his upmost to keep you on your toes during the lockdown enforcement.
The second opus of the practice papers special edition focuses on phraseology and listening comprehension.
From Blériot to CPDLC, follow the evolution of pilot-controller communication in aviation:
A quick remark about the second footnote: as mentioned in previous practice papers dealing with phraseology, there is only one publication left on the SIA site in reference to phraseology: the Manuel de formation à la phraséologie. The instructions formely found in the Procédures de radiotéléphonie are now available in section 14 – « voice communication procedures » – of the Standardised European Rules of the Air.
Review last week’s lesson with this listening comprehension exercise:
A few key messages and useful words
From L’Anglais pour voler, study these two double-pages revolving around radio operations:
And practice with a crossword.
What happens when radio communications go wrong:
Today is the end of the second week of intensive English training. Check your progress with another FCL.055 listening comprehension test:
Practice 1
Practice 2
PP #31 – Shelter-In-Place Special Edition n°1
Practice 03/04/2020
Quarantine, isolation, lockdown, shelter-in-place, stay-at-home, social distancing … you name it! Several words for one result: a lot of free time on your hands. Eliot is doing his share to help you with that! Until the end of these very strange times, expect a practice paper once a week, each offering a daily exercise. Stick to the program, you’ll notice a definite improvement.
Today is the first day of this new program, so let’s start with a general reminder of what you can do to improve your English:
Improve your English in 10 easy steps
Print the page, post it on the fridge, and practice one of the 10 steps instead of binging on junk food.
Two remarks:
– In step 7, the SIA has now only one document related to phraseology: the « Manuel de formation à la phraséologie »
– the correct internet address for step 8 is: https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/services/transport/aviation/regulated.
From L’Anglais pour voler, study these 2 double-pages to learn some basic words:
And practice with a wordsearch.
Reinforce the knowledge you acquired yesterday with this listening comprehension exercise, listen to the recording and find the missing words in the text:
An update on the footnotes in the article:
(1) is now: https://publicapps.caa.co.uk/modalapplication.aspx?catid=1&pagetype=65&appid=11&mode=detail&id=6973
(2) same internet address, but there is only one manual now, the « Manuel de formation à la phraséologie ».
It is important in radio communications to understand and jot down numbers correctly. Here is some practice:
Transmission of letters, numbers and frequencies
The FCL.055 was presented in full in Info-pilote’s October 2013 issue:
Not much has changed since then. The only noteworthy difference is found in the unusual situation test: applicants now have 90 seconds (instead of only 30) to read their card before explaining their trouble.
ATIS comprehension counts for 2 points in the FCL.055 listening comprehension test, and is also a key feature in the fictional flight. The good news: it’s an easy skill to work on.
Again, there is only one noteworthy change to consider in the article. In the footnote n°2, the UK’s airports ATIS phone numbers are now listed p.32 of the GetMet leaflet available on the Met Office site. Scroll down the » Aeronautical meteorology – service for low-level aviation » paragraph to the last entry: Training resources for pilots and GETMET.
Today is the end of the first week of intensive English training. Check your progress with this first FCL.055 listening comprehension test:
Practice 1
Practice 2
This Dictionary.com slide on new words the Coronavirus pandemic created and, to finish with a smile or two, a link to one of the many sites posting jokes on the subject .