Standard and nonstandard lexicon in aviation English: A corpus linguistic study

31st Pacific Asia Conference on Language, Information and Computation (PACLIC 31), pages 50–55 Cebu City, Philippines, November 16-18, 2017 Copyright c⃝2017 Ramsey Ferrer, Jollene Empinado, Eloisa Marie Calico and Jan Yharie Floro Standard and Nonstandard Lexicon in Aviation English: A Corpus Linguistic Study Ramsey S. Ferrer Jollene G. Empinado Philippine State College of Aeronautics Piccio Garden, Villamor, Pasay City, Philippines Philippine State College of Aeronautics Piccio Garden, Villamor, Pasay City, Philippines ramsey_ferrer@dlsu.edu.ph empinado34@gmail.com Eloisa Marie N. Calico Jan Yharie T. Floro Philippine State College of Aeronautics Piccio Garden, Villamor, Pasay City, Philippines Philippine State College of Aeronautics Piccio Garden, Villamor, Pasay City, Philippines calicoeloisamarie@yahoo.com janyhariefolor@gmail.com Abstract This study aims at investigating the lexical items in Aviation Phraseology that has both standard and nonstandard meanings when Pilot and Air Traffic Controller (ATC) use them in radiotelephony. A collection of Cockpit Voice Recorder or Quick Access Recorder transcripts with 26,421 words from the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) and from International Airlines’ accessible transcripts has been the primary data for scrutiny. Through a corpus-based analysis and a survey research, the present study reveals that the lexical items go ahead, hold short, priority, and affirm are used sporadically in nonstandard ways that might lead to ambiguity, and thus posing potential errors. In the survey conducted for Pilots and ATCs, both affirm the occurrence of nonstandard use in Aviation Phraseology. ATCs assert that the nonstandard use of such lexical items frequently occur during Route or En-route Clearance while Pilots confirm that these transpire during Takeoff Clearance, Altitude Clearance, Approach Clearance, and Landing Clearance. Precisely, the nonstandard use of Aviation Phraseology in this study shows nonconformity in the efforts of the International Civil Aviation Organization to provide “maximum clarity, brevity, and unambiguity”. Furthermore, awareness of this phenomenon must be heightened among aviation students who are future aeronautical professionals in the field. 1 Introduction English started as the official language of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) in 1951, and only in 2011 has the ICAO implemented language requirements on aviation personnel including the usage of standard phraseology in all radio communication. In recent years, the majority of aviation disasters have been caused by human errors, and one of the most common forms is miscommunication, which can potentially lead to catastrophic repercussions. One contributing factor to the occurrence of miscommunication is the wrong interpretation of instructions. For instance, the controller may use a certain word with standard definition to command, 50 but the pilot may interpret the word in non- standard way. Consequently, a single miscommunication may result in a bigger problem due to wrong interpretation. In June 2014, the Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB) reported a runway incursion at Ottawa International airport between a Medevac helicopter and A300 cargo plane. The airport controller amended LF 4 Medevac’s IFR clearance by stating: “LF 4 Medevac Roger, while we wait amend your Ottawa 3 for a right turn heading 290˚ balance unchanged”. The tower controller observed that AW139 was taxiing across the hold short …

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