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Well I think weâd all hope that pilots act a bit more professionally than thisâŠ
Pilot caught ranting on San Jose ATC frequency
Twitter user @lostpckt flags some interesting ATC audio (thanks to @olouie for bringing this to my attention). Specifically, this audio is from March 13, 2021, and is from the air traffic control (ATC) tower frequency at San Jose Airport (SJC) in California:
- You can find the entire ATC audio clip from LiveATC here (the audio in question starts 20min52sec in)
- You can find the relevant snippet here
In this audio clip you can hear a pilot ranting about San Jose, as he seemingly has a stuck mic that everyone on the frequency can hear. Itâs hard to make sense of what exactly the pilotâs point is (especially since we only hear one side of the conversation, given the hot mic), but hereâs what Iâm understanding:
- âF*ck this place, g*ddamn liberal f*cksâ
- âEight guns out here somewhere as it isâ
- âF*cking weirdos, probably driving around in f*cking Hyundais, f*cking roads and sh*t that go slow as f*ck
- âYou donât have balls unless youâre f*cking rolling coal man, g*ddamnitâ
Who says stuff like this?! And what exactly is his point? He has a problem with⊠Hyundais?
Do we know which pilot this is?
The person who flagged this audio suggests that this was a Southwest Airlines pilot, though Iâm not positive thatâs accurate.
Southwest Airlines flight 531 is on the frequency around the same time, which was a flight from San Jose to Seattle. The flight was awaiting takeoff at the time that this happened.
So while itâs entirely possible that itâs a Southwest Airlines pilot behind it, I canât be sure. It seems to me that the rant starts with something like â1043 is ready to go.â However:
- Itâs possible Iâm missing something, but Iâm not seeing any flight numbers of 1043 out of San Jose
- Then again, Iâm not convinced thatâs what he was actually saying, because once the hot mic is off, we hear no more talk of a flight 1043
- In that sense if this pilot was indeed caught on a hot mic, it wouldnât be surprising if the other pilot picks up communicating from there, in hopes of not being caught
So yeah, I canât be positive which airline this pilot worked for, but he sure could use a talking toâŠ
Bottom line
A pilot was caught on a hot mic at San Jose Airport a bit over a week ago, going on a bizarre rant. While a vast majority of airline pilots are professionals, there will of course be some bad apples.
Are there any clues Iâm missing that could tell us with certainty what pilot is behind this? Did I misunderstand the â1043â number, or?