[Closed] What do the bongs and bings mean?

They're for the cabin crew.

But what are they telling the trolley dollies?

I asked the nice easyjet lady that very question the other week. The first bong after take off is to tell them that the landing gear is stowed correctly. The second is to tell them that they can get up and wander around doing stuff (but not the passengers).

STW knows everything!

I always liked to think that the first bong was to say that we were sufficiently far from the ground that unexpected problems would not cause a plane/ground interface and we won't all be identified by our dental records.

Strangely I'm more on edge on me flight now that I know it's not the case...

The second is to tell them that they can get up and wander around doing stuff (but not the passengers).

The third one means they can start doing the passengers

Oooh I'm flying tomorrow, hopefully it'll be bong-tastic..!

Well, Carly who was 'cabin manager' on my flight this afternoon could start doing me anytime 😈

two bongs and a bing means the easy spray tan boot is ready - Cupernol Anyone

On the Airbus, the first bong is linked to the landing gear lever and evacuation lighting in the cabin (doesn't mean that it's actually up, just that we've selected it up or down). The second bong is the seat belt sign being flicked off and on to signal to the cabin crew that it's safe to move around.

If you're sitting near the front, you might hear a loud single chime from within the flight deck, which is a master caution (a whole range of things from an engine failure to an electrical fault), or a series of f***** loud bongs, which is a master warning* and much more serious (engine fire etc).

Also audible from the cabin is the "cavalry charge" which signals autopilot disconnection. Contrary to popular belief, we perform a manual landing in all but the foggiest conditions. Autoland needs special procedures implemented at the airport and doesn't cope with crosswind very well.

* Should you smoke in the toilet, you'll also set this off. You will not endear yourself to the flight crew and the shock it gives us means we will take great pleasure in watching you being manacled and carted off to some miserable foreign jail to be sodomised by the locals.

This completes your crash course in the A320 musical library. 🙂

Bong
[img] [/img]

Bing
[img] [/img]

Contrary to popular belief, we perform a manual landing in all but the foggiest conditions.

But you have aids, right? I mean landing aids 🙂 On the old flight sim I used to play I had something called ILS which would give you some crosshairs to line up.

I got quite good at flying that electronic plane.. I could land in the most terrifying ways that you would never seen in real life 🙂

A Biggidy Biggidy Bong means that an awsome radio show will be on, that none of the suits gets, will be cut off in it's prime afternoon slot and be rememberd as the greatest show on earth. From Manchester.

But you have aids, right? I mean landing aids On the old flight sim I used to play I had something called ILS which would give you some crosshairs to line up.

A manual landing refers to not letting the plane "autoland". 99.9% of landings by commercial planes at the usual large airports are flown using instruments such as ILS (or even MLS at one airport with one special airline) they rarely fly "visual" approaches which are done completely by hand.

molgrips - yep, most airports are equipped with an ILS on at least one runway. It's presented as "raw data", as in it only shows our relative deviation from the ideal approach path.

Scoured the interwebs for you and you can just make it out on this photo someone took. The ILS info is below and to the right of the artificial horizon, showing the plane somewhat below and significantly to the right of the ILS. Flight directors - the green bars - are showing something entirely different.

dharmstrong - it's not quite 99.9%. Smaller airports only have an ILS onto their favoured runway, and so if the wind favours the reciprocal we have to fly a non-precision approach, usually from a VOR or NDB. This only provides guidance in azimuth - and only to the airport, not the runway - so from about 1000 ft the approach is completely hand flown with visual references only.

In most airports, this is a PAPI, but some don't even have that, such as Lyon, where a non-precision approach simply requires a bloody good guess. 🙂

Any approach into Manchester in the evening will be a non-precision; Sharm-el-Sheikh always is; Paphos sometimes; most places at some point.

True visual approaches (where ATC gives us free rein to position ourselves to land) are fairly rare, but not uncommon. Liverpool will always give you one if it's quiet, so will the Spanish airports if they're not on strike.

Hope that clears things up.

Sorry I meant big airports like mine 😉

Ah, but you're missing all the fun. 😉

Surely ATC will help you line up though? Otherwise you'd be circling around looking for the direction the runway's facing in..