“Cessna 9130 Delta, Oakland Center, radio check,” says the controller.
“Cessna 9130 Delta, loud and clear,” the pilot answers.
“Cessna 9130,” says the controller, “that was my third attempt to call you. If you want to continue with flight following, you’re going to have to listen for your call sign.”
Why didn’t the pilot answer ATC the first 2 times the controller called him? I can think of 3 possibilities. 1. He was distracted. 2. He heard ATC but chose not to answer. 3. He got tired of listening and mentally tuned out.
Reason 1, distraction, is easy to understand because we’ve all been there. Something happens in the cockpit that takes your attention away from listening to the radio. When flying, the possibilities for distraction are endless. I could name some distractions, but I’m sure you’ve experienced enough of your own to be very familiar with the problem.
Reason 2, prioritizing, is also pretty easy to grasp. From our very first day as student pilots, our flight instructors told us our priorities were, “Aviate, navigate, communicate”, in that order. If flying the aircraft or staying on an airway centerline requires your full attention, then answering the radio can wait.
Tuning Out
Reason 3 is a little more complicated than the first two explanations. When a radio frequency is very busy with conversation, and you aren’t part of any of the ongoing conversations, its easy to become numb to the chatter.
We pilots like to think we are excellent at monitoring our environment. With practice, we learn to crosscheck the daylights out of our aircraft’s flight instruments. When the aircraft engine makes an unusual sound, our ears pick up on it immediately. If an updraft causes our aircraft to change pitch, we feel the change in our gut.
Pilots are excellent at detecting changes. We don’t do as well at paying attention to the unchanged. Tuning out background noise is a natural process of survival. Filtering what we perceive as irrelevant allows us to focus on and process information we perceive as important.
There’s plenty of good research available online about paying attention–vigilance–in the cockpit. The FAA and NASA have done their fair share of study in this area. If you want to look at this research yourself, Google “scholarly studies on cockpit vigilance”.
Train Your Ear
If we accept that our brains are programmed to tune out background noise, and we understand that chatter on the radio can be perceived as background noise, then how do we overcome our tendency to tune out?
The answer is embedded in the example that opened this article. The controller said, “Listen for your call sign”. He doesn’t expect you to listen to all of the chatter on the radio. He knows that you can and should listen for the cue that tells you, “What follows is intended for you.”
Mentally tuning in when you hear your call sign is similar to paying attention when you hear your name mentioned in the din of a crowded room.
Other Strategies
To give yourself the best possible chance of hearing your call sign when it’s spoken, you’ll want to create an environment that does not compete with listening to the radio. When the radio gets busy, stop all non-essential conversation in the cockpit. If passengers or a flying partner must talk, have a visual cue to indicate you need them to stop talking temporarily, such as holding up your index finger in a “wait-a-moment” gesture.
Shut down other possible distractors, such as music playing over the intercom. Limit your own activity to the basics of flying and navigating. Paperwork or reading can wait until the radio calms down.
The Expectation
You can’t fight nature. Your brain is designed to tune out noise, and irrelevant conversations on the radio are noise. At the same time, your brain is pretty good at picking up on sudden changes in the environment.
Admit to yourself you won’t be able to consistently monitor every conversation thread on the radio. Removing the stress of trying to listen to everything will give you the breathing room to listen for your call sign. Reduce the noise in your own cockpit as much as possible and you will be ready for the next ATC transmission that’s directed at you.
Questions? Comments? I’m right here in the comments section below and at jeff@atccommunication.com. I’m also reachable at atc_jeff@twitter.com.