Why do aviators say roger to indicate they’ve received a message? A pilot phones the show about that, wilco, and similar language. This is part of a complete episode.
An F-18 fighter pilot worries that a term he and his colleagues often use isn’t a legitimate word. It’s deconflict, which means to ensure that aircraft aren’t in the same airspace. Grant reassures him that deconflict is a perfectly...
meat-bomb n.— «When I was learning to parachute (or become a “meat-bomb,” as the pilots refer to it) the jump master told us that the horizon-wide landing zone (LZ) contained one object and one object only: a tree...
ditch-switch n.— «It also turns out that the pilots on Flight 1549 did not throw the so-called “ditch-switch,” designed to seal the plane’s belly and make it more buoyant after a water landing. Investigators say the pilots...
There’s the late CNN broadcaster William Headline, the preacher named James God, and the physician named Dr. Hurt. Names like these that match the person’s profession are called aptronyms or aptonyms. We talk about the man who coined the...
gangloading n.— «Yesterday I joined 14 students in the altitude training chamber at the Eighty-ninth Physiological Training Flight at Andrews Air Force Base in Camp Springs, Maryland. Wearing helmets and oxygen masks that covered...