Air and Ground Radio Communications in Today's Aviation

Air and Ground Radio Communications in Today's Aviation

Sidney De Leon Mazariegos

Embry Riddle Aeronautical University

Science & Aviation/Aerospace in Society

HUMN 400

Eduardo Bastidas

October 25, 2013

Air and Ground Radio Communications in Today's Aviation

For decades, pilots and air traffic controllers have been using radios to communicate and keep the airways safe. But has it always been easy to communicate your intentions to a control tower, or other airplanes flying around you? Communication is an essential part of aviation operations. In this paper, I will present a brief history of air and ground radio communications, as well as the five types of communication in aviation such as; verbal, non-verbal, written, graphic and automated communication, in addition to some communication barriers, which may limit aviation operations. Finally, I will talk about the different radios used in today’s aviation that supports air and ground communications.

In the early days of aviation around 1919, two names show up in the Official U.S. Bulletin, a daily U.S. government publication: Captain Horton and Colonel Culver, both from the U.S. Army. They flew an airplane at an air meet in Sheepshead Bay section of Brooklyn, New York, sending a radio signal from a transmitter credited to Capt. Horton, to a receiver on the ground built by Col Culver. Later on in 1915, Culver was sent to San Diego, California where he continued his efforts to further radio communications. A year later, a message was transmitted between two airplanes in flight, followed by a voice communication between an aircraft and the ground in 1916. In the 1930’s the airline industry grew steadily during the depression years. On the other hand, the depressed economy took its toll on improvements of radio communications and improvement in aviation safety had to wait until the end of the depression. During that decade the occurrence of fourteen fatal accidents raised awareness for the...