Product Description

Featuring the newest VFR -- as well as IFR -- regulations and procedures, this new edition includes the most current information needed to become proficient in the area of radio communications.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #125644 in Books
• Published on: 1998-04-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 272 pages

From the Back Cover
An up-to-the-minute revision of the VFR pilots' sourcebook, this handbook adds important depth to the most thorough treatment of how to communicate confidently from the cockpit. In addition to updates of preceding editions, there are two brand-new chapters: one covers NTSB-provided examples of incidents caused primarily by human errors in communications; the other gives guidelines designed specifically to help pilots become more skilled communicators in an era of ever-busier airspaces and airports. VFR communications skills are surprisingly underaddressed in modern pilot training. This essential reference fills the gap with detailed coverage encompassing all the fundamentalsNincluding radio facilities and communication responsibilities. With specific examples of how to conduct dialogue, and how dangerous assumption-making can be in the course of communicating, the book offers thorough grounding in: competence in cockpit communications; how to avoid communication failures; airspace classifications summaryNcontrolled and uncontrolled airspaces defined; Multicom airport radio communications (including a simulated landing and takeoff using Multicom); Unicom airport radio communications (including a simulated landing and takeoff using Unicom); Flight Service Stations and radio communications; Automatic Terminal Information Service; Ground Control; transponders; Approach/Departure Control; working with Air Route Traffic Control Centers on VFR flights; what to do if you have radio failure ; cross-country flight. This is the only place that gives pilots everything they need to be excellent VFR communicators.

About the Author
Paul E. Illman (Prairie Village, KS) is an experienced single- and multiengine pilot. He is also the author of the Pilot's Air Traffic Control Handbook, Second Edition, and the Pilot's Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge, Third Edition.

Customer Reviews

A truly thorough, comprehensive, practical guide.
This handbook is a definite must for the novice and professional alike. Written in a clear, no-nonsense approach, it explains, with actual dialog, proper radio communication procedure in environments ranging from Multicom to a Class A airspace. Insight is given into what situations an air traffic controller must deal with, and how a pilot can anticipate and communicate the information required of him.

Really good book to get you ready to take on mic fright
This is an excellent book to familiarize yourself with air traffic control and tower talk. I'm a private pilot and I learned in a relatively low trafficked area in Maine. The Portland tower was nearby but I didn't take advantage of it too much. I read the book one summer while I was still a student pilot . . . when I went up with an instructor and we headed to a towered airport he was very impressed on how I knew how to call them up and respond to them, I understood the flow of frequency changes well, and understood all the instructions I received from ATC before he ever taught me any of that stuff. Even if you are already a pilot, but still avoid going to towered airports because you're afraid of getting embarassed you should most definitely get this book.
The actual examples he gives are right on the money. The good part is that he give you variations on how to say the same thing so in case you hear it differently from someone you'll be ready. I don't really have any complaints with this book that I can think of at the moment. It's helpful to VFR student, and actual pilots, it has realistic examples, good explanation of why things are the way they are with ATC, explains the ATC environment well. Get it!

Useful, but not written very well.
The book is useful, and it was badly needed when it was first published, but it was not written very well. For every paragraph of substantial or useful information, there is a page of repetition and imprecise fluff-- the book would have been twice as good had it been half as long. Again, the book is good and will not be a waste of money, but there are other pilot communication books out now that deserve a closer look. Don't assume that this book is better simply because it is longer.