PilotEdge Forums

Hello!
I was wondering, when flying in the pattern, if you still need to specify who you are talking to when, for example, announcing downwind.
Do you need to say for example: "San Luis Tower, Cherokee 1427X, midfield downwind RWY 16" or can you just say "Cherokee 1427X, midfield downwind, RWY 16"?
Thanks in advance!

Once you've established comms, ie. you've stated who it is you're trying to reach the first time, there isn't much need to say it at the start of each call. Tower knows you're talking to them since there are no other logical choices.

Good to know. I was not aware of that little tidbit. I always to the whole bit but it does make sense. You've already established communication, they've given you clearance to that point, so yeah, nothing more needs said.

Now I just have to break the habit. (If I could do that I wouldn't still be smoking)

On a different pitch of the same chorus...
I seem to have a bad habit of shortening my call sign after the initial call to a controller. To this point I have never been scolded and I know it isn't up to me but just can't seem to break the habit.

Just saying I have a lot of bad habits to break! ( get in line )

Happy Friday!!

Roger,

Honestly, if you shorten your callsign first, practically speaking, very few ppl are going to complain. It's a tricky situation because the first time around, the controller is going to respond with your full callsign to make sure everything is correct. Then, he/she may remember to shorten it at some point. If you're doing readbacks, I honestly don't think you're going to catch any grief for shortening it if the controller hasn't yet. This is purely subjective, not official guidance, but it happens 99% of the time in the real world. If the controller has a problem, they will point it out and will let you know about traffic they're working with a similar callsign, hence the need for full callsigns.

However, make sure your very FIRST call with that frequency is your full callsign. It's a significant error to call in on a new freq with partial callsign. Also, if you're INITIATING a call, as opposed to responding to a call, and the controller hasn't shortened it, I'd be more inclined to use the full callsign there, too. In short, when you're RESPONDING to a controller, the shortened callsign will rarely cause an issue.