Ever pull over and ask someone for directions only to be met with a minutes-long diatribe whereupon halfway through you realize that the person doesn’t actually know how to get to where you’re going? It’s like they just want to hear themselves talk. Imagine pulling that around 5:30 p.m. on a Friday in Class C airspace. We’ve all heard that student pilot stutter their way through a transmission with enough “umms” to fill a Vinyasa yoga class in Santa Monica.
Succinctness is the single most prized quality a pilot can exhibit when on the radio. It’s almost as if that little push-to-talk button is buried on the backside of the yoke so as to remind you to only use it when necessary. Break glass in case of communication.
