Author: Gareth

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Runway incursion

Here’s the text to the listening from yesterday. Enjoy!!

A small private aircraft was taxiing towards the runway after receiving taxi instructions. The pilot flying was told to hold short of the runway and wait for clearance.
At the same time an Airbus A320 was lined up and holding on the opposite end of the runway for takeoff. The A320 was given clearance to take off and began its roll for takeoff.
30 seconds later the small private aircraft radioed ATC to say that they had made a taxi error and that they were on the threshold of the runway.
The A320 had lifted off at this point and there was no collision between the two aircraft, but an investigation will start to find out what happened.

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Runway incursion

Listen to this recording and try to write what your understand. You can listen as many times as you like.

Check below the recording for some of the difficult words and come back and check the full text from this recording tomorrow.

Suggested ICAO level: 3+

Have a great day!

Difficult words: hold short of, roll for takeoff, collision,

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Bluefin-21

Here’s an interesting video of about the Bluefin-21, the robotic mini-submarine that the search team in the Indian Ocean are using to try to find the wreckage site of MH370..

Suggested ICAO level: 5+

Have a great weekend!!

Bluefin-21 AUV – The Ultimate Offshore Survey Platform

Check out this new version of Bluefin-21 Animation (includes sequences on collision avoidance and broad area coverage). ___ The Bluefin-21 is a highly modular autonomous underwater vehicle able to carry multiple sensors and payloads at once. It boasts a high energy capacity that enables extended operations even at the greatest depths.

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Taxiway landing

Here’s the text to the listening from yesterday.

Enjoy!!

A Boeing 737-800 was cleared to land on the runway, but touched down on a taxiway which is parallel to the runway. After the plane touched down, it rolled out safely. At the time of landing there was no other traffic on the taxiway.

The weather conditions were perfect that day, but the pilot said that the approach chart was confusing and he thought that the runway was to the north of the localizer. This caused him to land on the taxiway, which he thought was the runway.

The runway is 2800 metres long and 45 metres wide and the taxiway is also 2800 metres long, but only 30 metres wide.

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Taxiway landing

Listen to this recording and try to write what your understand. You can listen as many times as you like.

Check below the recording for some of the difficult words and come back and check the full text from this recording tomorrow.

Suggested ICAO level: 3+

Have a great day!

Difficult words: roll out (v.), approach chart (n.), parallel (adj.)

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The high tech tools searching for MH370

Here’s a video describing the high tech tools being used to search for MH370.

See below the video for the full text.

Suggested ICAO level: 4+

Have a great weekend!!

“The hunt for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 is growing ever more high tech. To narrow down the search zone, a device called a pinger locator is lowered into the water and pulled behind a ship. When a ping from the jet’s black box is detected, a signal is transmitted up the tow cable where searchers can hear it and judge its strength. They do this over and over to triangulate the location of the black box. Once the location is confirmed, a robotic mini-sub will be deployed. The robosub sweeps the sea floor with sonar pulses identifying objects below and creating a visual map of the crash site. If an accurate site is ever identified a remotely-operated submersible will be sent to the sea floor to collect materials.”