Proceeding Hong Kong to London along airways B330 northbound at 9600 meters, I was witness to the following three way RT "Confucian" between British Airways, Lufthansa and ground control. The Flight Call sign "Speedbird 26" was following a Lufthansa A320 call sign "Lufthansa 185" at the same flight level. The airway has a reporting point called ELKAL in the Guilin Flight Information Region. The ETA of BA26 at ELKAL was 1748 UTC.

Sound of heavily accented fast speaking Chinese Air Traffic controller's voice with no intonation.

"Speedbih two six wha yu tie elka?"

"Speedbird two six our type of aircraft is a Boeing Seven Four Seven"

"I think he means he wants our estimated time at position ELKAL"

"Speedbird two six , disregard, I say again we estimate ELKAL at 48"

This transmission elicits no response from the controller (probably because he is busy trying to work out our horizontal separation from the Lufthansa)

"Lufthansa wo ate fi wha yu tie elka?"

German accent "Lufthansa one eight five type of aircraft A three two zero"

"Confir elka tie three two ?"

oh no!, I think I think to myself how are we going to sort this out?

"Negative ve are an A three twenty and ve estimate position elka at three eight"

"Loja, Speedbih two six yu leduce spee ma ate wo"

"Roger Speedbird two six, understand reduce speed to Mach decimal eight one. I say again we are estimating position ELKAL at time four eight and we are a Boeing Seven Four seven.

"Loja Speedbih two six you confirm you tie elkal now four eight not four seven?"

"That is affirmative Speedbird two six is estimating position ELKAL at time four eight"

"Loja, yu maintay normal spee"

So much for using English as a common language Return to index