I tend to listen to C9 on take off and then about 30 mins before landing. It's great to hear all the conversations and accents on approach to airports such as LHR and ORD. The best feeling is when the ATC says to make a sharp turn and you feel the AC bank. You feel really connected.

Ch.9 is great on approaches because of other flight traffic and geography below....if you know the approaches into an airport, say IAD you can spot a ton of stuff especially if you live in the area. One of the most enjoyable was the approach into LAX from the east, the long straight in from over the mountains.....had another UAL 767 on the parallel appraoch and witnessed all of their flap/gear extensions, speed reductions, etc. just about the same time as us.

Another nice experience was departing out of ORD for KIX this summer listening to CH.9 with Mrs. PLTHOO and taxiing out to the runway with all of the other Asian traffic and the noon push. Clearly reconized the we were going to the end of the displaced threshold while other domestic traffic was sequenced ahead of us farther down the runway. All of the other long range stuff was behind us....multiple 747/777.

I got to hear a BMI pilot on CH. 9 at ORD today. Sure, I'm sure the frequenters don't care...but I'd never heard an English pilot before, so there. :D

Question
 

This thread has reminded me of a question I've been meaning to ask since my LAS-IAD flight last Wednesday (11/30). I was listening to Ch. 9 and they were making all of the traffic over a certain part of the Front Range decend to 290 or below. Apparently, there was a "severe mountain wave" and had caused a 737 to "lose control" of the plane. Now I know that the mountains frequently cause unstable air, but I'm unfamiliar with the term "mountain wave." Does anybody know exactly what that means? I also don't know technically what "lose control" means.

We flew through with only minor bumps, but ATC was taking this all very seriously. Anybody else hear this? Any insight?

A mountain wave is caused by the vertical displacement of air flowing over the mountain. Think of a large submerged rock in a fast flowing stream. Mountain waves occur when the jet stream is strong and the atmospheric temperature profile is just right, which can happen in the winter. Mountain waves are stationary or very slow moving (because their cause, the mountain, isn't moving) unlike the traveling waves at the beach which move toward shore. Even though the mountain wave isn't moving, the air is flowing through the wave rapidly. Sometimes the wave is accompanied by turbulence.

"Lose control" means exactly that. The mountain waves can have strong updrafts and downdrafts which toss the plane around no matter what the pilot does. Eventually the plane will come out of the wave and the pilot can regain control.

As in your example, pilots will try to avoid the areas and altitudes with strong waves.

Finally, I'll add my thanks for Putt4eagle's story, too.

Channel 9 Gem
 

956 last week, mid-flight...

Channel 9 had been working fine, etc.

Suddenly I hear a female voice come on, "Hello?"

Co-pilot "Can one of you come up here and block the door? (Captain's name) is (hungry/thirsty) and I really need to take a leak!"

I loved it! Have you heard any other good ones?

LMAO! :D ^

Unfortunately, I have never had this happen! :(

One time recently they "accidentally" patched through the company freq on top of the ATC freq when taxiing at LAS. Apparently they were having routing trouble. Kudos to the crew for getting us there mostly on time despite the fact that the powers that be at UA were having trouble that day.

On a side note, my outbound flight to LGA had to return to the gate from the taxiway since they suspected that the ground crew left the "lav" hatch on the bottom of the plane open.

Just arrived at ORD from LAX. While taxiing to the gate after landing, we apparently encountered an "obstruction" on the taxiway, leading to the following Channel 9 exchange:

United xxx: "Uhm, what is that American doing here??"

American: "Making Money!"

United xxx: "Hardly."

That's classic.

I was on a SW flight taxing to the terminal when the captain said, "passengers, on our left is an AA plane, everybody look out the window and make the plane look full!" Nice to have a sense of humor on a flight.

Another classic:

ATC: United XXX, traffic at your 11 o'clock, flight level 320 eastbound, an American F-100

United XXX : Always wanted to say this, we have the American Fokker in sight

:)

I've had flight deck to ground comm sometimes come across CH9 on occassion. While waiting for pushback one flight, there was an interesting discussion of the powers at WHQ. I'll just say they were in agreement with their thoughts.

This happened to me for the entire flight, and I was purser. No one spoke up until the deplaning. I told the Capt. I wanted back up and he gave it to me, gladly, along with a big apology. We have private conversations on there and no way did I want any letters being written. Some off-line j/s'er in the cockpit was flipping switches and caused the cabin to go on. Needless to say, as a HUGE proponent of Ch. 9, if this were the norm I would have to change my stance on having it available.

:D

Leaving SAN a couple of weeks ago, we are sitting on the taxiway 'waiting for papers' for a few minutes. Tower comes on and tells us to move out of the active taxiway to a side spot stating "do not block Southwest", who was also queued on the side waiting for some company info.
As we roll over to the side I look out the window and see that we are turning right in front of Southwest and then we stop. We sat there for maybe 2 seconds when Southwest comes on and says they are ready to go. Tower comes back on and screams "United, damnit, I told you not to block Southwest. Move!" Needless to say we then found our paperwork and tookoff.

I sounded like the same controller that kept asking a coast guard chopper if they had a visual on us. she started asking maybe 5-7 miles out and when they still didn't have us in sight under a mile, she basically screamed that if they still couldn't see us the should get out of the airspace.