Audio: Mumbai air traffic controller scolds Jet Airways' pilots for shoddy reporting

Some more light hearted articles in the spirit of the Diwali holidays.

On the night of 12 November, 2012, Jet Airways Boeing 737-800 VT-JGS was performing flight 9W-556 from Kochi, India to Doha, Qatar. Routing was via airway M300 waypoints IGAMA OSIRI NITIX MESAN LEMAX KADOL.

The pilot attempts to radio in his AIREP informing Mumbai Radio that the flight is over waypoint MESAN.

He does not follow the prescribed ICAO format of saying Jet Airways 556 check position MESAN 15:58 (UTC time), maintaining Flight Level 340 (34,000 feet), estimate LEMAX at 16:18 next, (optional) estimate KADOL next at 16:39.

In true desi style, the Air Traffic Controller manning the HF frequency of Mumbai radio gives the Jet Airways pilot a dressing down, followed by a lesson on the correct protocol and ICAO procedure to be followed for an AIREP which the chastened pilots meekly follow.

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Audio and Video: The moaning of GE90-115B - the largest commercial jet engine

Ask any plane spotter about the General Electric GE90-155B engines and you will get a universal thumbs-up. The largest engines fitted on any commercial jet, two GE90's power every Boeing 777 made today; the -300ER, the -200LR, or the freighter.

Put the engine size in perspective. Compare the ground engineer near the nose wheel.

To give you an idea of size, the diameter of the engine (11 ft 3 in or 3.429 m) is just a little less than the fuselage diameter of the Boeing 737, and at take-off thrust the engine swallows more than two million cubic feet of air per minute. More technical details can be read here.

Apart from its size, what spotters love about the engine is the unique "moaning" sound it makes the engine turbine fired at start-up.

All commercial jet engines today, are started using compressed air. The compressed air is produced by the auxillary power unit (APU) located in the tail of the aircraft and fed via ducts to the engines. This are blows the engine blades around through a series of gearbox, shafts, and starter. When the engine blades are sped up to a certain point, fuel is injected into the engine and ignited. At this moment the GE90 produces its signature moan and the engine starts.

This is what the engine start-up sounds like from outside



This is from inside the cabin

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